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A slight, dark form stole from the shadows and laid a hand 
on the stooping man’s shoulder. (Page 122.) 









THE 

CHIEF LEGATEE 


ANNA KATHARINE GREEN 


AUTHOR OF 


‘*THE LEAVENWORTH CASE,” “INITIALS ONLY,” 
ETC., ETC. 



NEW YORK 

DODD, MEAD & COMPANY 

1916 





COPTBIGHT, 1906, BT 

ANNA KATHARINE GREEN ROHLFS 


Entered at Stationera’ Hall. 
All rights reserved 


iTt 


CONTENTS 





PART I. — A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 



CHAPTER 




PAGE 

I. 

A Bride of Five Hours . 



7 

II. 

The Lady in Number Three . 



22 

III. 

“He Knows the Word” . 



29 

IV. 

Mr. Ransom Waits . 



40 

V. 

In Corridor and in Room 



47 

VI. 

The Lawyer .... 



62 

- VII. 

Rain ..... 



68 

VIII. 

Elimination .... 



76 

IX. 

Hunter’s Inn 



86 

PART II.— -THE CALL OP THE WATERFALL 


X. 

Two Doors .... 



97 

XI. 

Half-Past One in the Morning 

, . 


108 

XII. 

“Georgian” .... 



113 

XIII. 

Where the Mill Stream Runs Fiercest . 


117 

XIV. 

A Detective’s Work 



126 

XV. 

Anitra ..... 



155 

XVI. 

“Love” .... 



168 

XVII. 

“I Don’t Hear” . 

• 


176 


PART III. — MONEY 




XVIII. 

God’s Forest, Then Man’s . 



185 

XIX. 

In Mrs. Deo’s Room 



205 

XX. 

Between the Elderberry Bushes 



219 

XXI. 

On the Cars .... 



227 

XXII. 

A Suspicious Test . 



241 


/ 


4 CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PA6H 

XXIII. A Startling Decision . . • . . 261 

XXIV. The Devil’s Cauldron 255 


PART IV. — THE MAN OP MYSTERY 


XXV. 

Death Eddy . 




. 262 

XXVI. 

Hazen .... 




. 271 

XXVII. 

She Speaks . 

• 



. 280 

XXVIII. 

Fifteen Minutes 

• 



. 286 

XXIX. 

“There is One WayP 

• 



. 303 

XXX. 

Not Yet 




. 315 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


1 . 


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iH 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


PART I 

A Woman of Mystery 
CHAPTER I 

A BRIDE OF FIVE HOURS 

“ WhaPs up?^’ 

This from the manager of the Hotel to 

his chief clerk. Something wrong in Room 
81 ?’^ 

^^Yes, sir. Fve just sent for a detective. 
You were not to be found and the gentleman is 
desperate. But very anxious to have it all 
kept quiet; very anxious. I think we can 
oblige him there, or, at least, we’ll try. Am I 
right, sir?” 

Of course, if — ” 

- Oh! it’s nothing criminal. The lady’s miss- 
ing, that’s all; the lady whose name you see 
here.” 

The register lay open between them; the 


8 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


elerk^s finger, running along the column, rested 
about half-way down. 

The manager bent over the page. 

^ Roger J. Ransom and wife,’ ” he read out in 
decided astonishment. “ Why, they are — ” 

“ You’re right. Married to-day in Grace 
Church. A great wedding; the papers are full 
of it. Well, she’s the lady. They registered 
here a few minutes before five o’clock and in 
ten minutes the bride was missing. It’s a queer 
story Mr. Ransom tells. You’d better hear it. 
Ah, there’s our man! Perhaps you’ll go up 
with him.” 

^^You may bet your last dollar on that,” 
muttered the manager. And joining the new- 
comer, he made a significant gesture which 
was all that passed between them till they 
stepped out on the second floor. 

Wanted in Room 81?” the manager now 
asked. 

Yes, by a man named Ransom.” 

“Just so. That’s the door. Knock — or, 
rather. I’ll knock, for I must hear his story as 
soon as you do. The reputation of the hotel — ” 

“ Yes, yes, but the gentleman’s waiting. Ah! 
that’s better.” 

The manager had just knocked. 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


9 


An exclamation from within, a hurried step, 
and the door fell open. The figure which met 
their eyes was startling. Distress, anxiety, and 
an impatience almost verging on frenzy, dis- 
torted features naturally amiable if not hand- 
some. 

“ My wife,’^ fell in a gasp from his writhing 
lips. 

“We have come to help you find her,’^ Mr. 
Gerridge calmly assured him. Mr. Gerridge was 
the detective. Relate the circumstances, sir. 
Tell us where you were when you first missed 
her.^’ 

, v Mr. Ransom’s glance wandered past him to 
tjie door. It was partly open. The manager, 
whose name was Loomis, hastily closed it. Mr. 
Ransom showed relief and hurried into his 
story. It was to this effect : 

“ I was married to-day in Grace Church. At 
the altar my bride — you probably know her 
name. Miss Georgian Hazen — wore a natural 
look, and was in all respects, so far as any one 
could see, a happy woman, satisfied with her 
choice and pleased with the eclat and elegancies 
of the occasion. Half-way down the aisle this 
all changed. I remember the instant perfectly. 
Her hand was on my arm and I felt it suddenly 


10 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


stiffen. I was not alarmed, but I gave her a 
quick look and saw that something had hap- 
pened. What, I could not at the moment 
determine. She didn’t answer when I spoke 
to her and seemed to be mainly concerned in 
getting out of the church before her emotions 
overcame her. This she succeeded in doing 
with my help; and, once in the vestibule, re- 
covered herself so completely, and met all my 
inquiries with such a gay shrug of the shoulders, 
that I should have passed the matter over as a 
mere attack of nerves, if I had not afterwards 
detected in her face, through all the hurry and 
excitement of the ensuing reception, a strained 
expression not at all natural to her. This was 
still more evident after the congratulations of a 
certain guest, who, I am sure, whispered to her 
before he passed on; and when the time came 
for her to go up-stairs she was so pale and unlike 
herself that I became seriously alarmed and 
asked if she felt well enough to start upon the 
journey we had meditated. Instantly her man- 
ner changed. She turned upon me with a look 
I have been trying ever since to explain to 
myself, and begged me not to take her out of 
town to-night but to some quiet hotel where 
we might rest for a few days before starting on 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


11 


our travels. She looked me squarely in the 
eye as she made this request and, seeing in her 
nothing more than a feverish anxiety lest I should 
make difficulties of some kind, I promised to 
do what she asked and bade her run away and 
get herself ready to go and say nothing to any 
one of our change of plan. She smiled and 
turned away towards her own room, but pres- 
ently came hurrying back to ask if I would 
grant her one more favor. Would I be so good 
as not to speak to her or expect her to speak 
to me till we got to the hotel; she was feeling 
very nervous but was sure that a few minutes 
of complete rest would entirely restore her; 
something had occurred (she acknowledged 
this) which she wanted to think out; wouldn^t 
I grant her this one opportunity of doing so? 
It was a startling request, but she looked so 
lovely — pardon me, I must explain my easy 
acquiescence — that I gave her the assurance 
she wished and went about my own prepara- 
tions, somewhat disconcerted but still not at all 
prepared for what happened afterward. I had 
absolutely no idea that she meant to leave 
me.” 

Mr. Ransom paused, greatly affected; but 
upon the detective asking him how and when 


12 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


Mrs. Ransom had deserted him, he controlled 
himself sufficiently to say: 

“Here; immediately after that silent and 
unnatural ride. She entered the office with me 
and was standing close at my side all the time 
I was writing our names in the register; but 
later, when I turned to ask her to enter the 
elevator with me, she was gone, and the boy 
who was standing by with our two bags said 
that she had slipped into the reception-room 
across the hall. But I didn^t find her there or 
in any of the adjoining rooms. Nor has any- 
body since succeeded in finding her. She has 
left the building — left me, and — 

“ You want her back again?” 

This from the detective, but very dryly. 

“Yes. For she was not following her own 
inclinations in thus abandoning me so soon after 
the words which made us one were spoken. 
Some influence was brought to bear on her 
which she felt unable to resist. I have confi- 
dence enough in her to believe that. The 
rest is mystery — a mystery which I am forced 
to ask you to untangle. I have neither 
the necessary calmness nor experience my- 
self.” 

“ But you surely have done something,” pro- 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


13 


tested Gerridge. Telephoned to her late home 
or — ” 

“ Oh yes, I have done all that, but with no 
result. She has not returned to her old home. 
Her uncle has just been here and he is as much 
mystified by the whole occurrence as I am. He 
could tell me nothing, absolutely nothing.’^ 
Indeed! and the man, the one who whis- 
pered to her during the reception, couldnT you 
learn anything about him?^’ 

Mr. Ransom’s face took on an expression 
almost ferocious. 

“No. He’s a stranger to Mr. Fulton; yet 
Mr. Fulton’s niece introduced him to me as a 
relative.” 

“ A relative? When was that?” 

“At the reception. He was introduced as 
Mr. Hazen (my wife’s maiden name, you know), 
and when I saw how his presence disturbed her, 
I said to her, ‘ A cousin of yours?’ and she an- 
swered with very evident embarrassment, ^ A rel- 
ative’; — which you must acknowledge didn’t 
locate him very definitely. Mr. Fulton doesn’t 
know of any such relative. And I don’t believe 
he is a relative. He didn’t sit with the rest of 
the family in the church.” 

“ Ah! you saw him in the church.” 


14 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


“ Yes. I noticed him for two reasons. First, 
because he occupied an end seat and so came 
directly under my eye in our passage down the 
aisle. Secondly, because his face of all those 
which confronted me when I looked for the 
cause of her sudden agitation, was the only one 
not turned towards her in curiosity or interest. 
His eyes were fixed and vacant; his only. That 
made him conspicuous and when I saw him 
again I knew him.^^ 

Describe the man.’’ 

Mr. Ransom’s face lightened up with an 
expression of strong satisfaction. 

I am going to astonish you,” said he. 
^‘The fellow is so plain that children must cry 
at him. He has suffered some injury and his 
mouth and jaw have such a twist in them that 
the whole face is thrown out of shape. So you 
see,” continued the unhappy bridegroom, as 
his eyes flashed from the detective’s face to 
that of the manager’s, “ that the influence he 
exerts over my wife is not that of love. No 
one could love him. The secret’s of another 
kind. What kind, what, what, what? Find out 
and I’ll pay you any amount you ask. She is too 
dear and of too sensitive a temperament to be 
subject to a wretch of his appearance. I cannot 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


15 


bear the thought. It stifles, it chokes me; and 
yet for three hours Fve had to endure it. Three 
hours! and with no prospect of release unless 
you — 

“ Oh, Ifll do something,” was Gerridge^s bland 
reply. “ But first I must have a few more facts. 
A man such as you describe should be easy to 
find; easier than the lady. Is he a tall man?” 

Unusually so.” 

“ Dark or light?” 

Dark.” 

“Any beard?” 

“None. ThaFs why the injury to his jaw 
shows so plainly.” 

“ I see. Is he what you would call a gentle- 
man?” 

“Yes, I must acknowledge that. He shows 
the manners of good society, if he did whisper 
words into my wife^s ear which were not meant 
for mine.” 

“And Mr. Fulton knows nothing of him?” 

“ Nothing.” 

“ Well, wefll drop him for the present. You 
have a photograph of your wife?” 

“ Her picture was in all the papers to-night.” 

“ I noticed. But can we go by it? Does it 
resemble her?” 


16 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


“Only fairly. She is far prettier. My wife 
is something uncommon. No picture ever does 
her justice.” 

“ She looks like a dark beauty. Is her hair 
black or brown?” 

“ Black. So black it has purple shades in it.” 

“And her eyes? Black too?” 

“No, gray. A deep gray, which look black 
owing to her long lashes.” 

“Very good. Now about her dress. De- 
scribe it as minutely as you can. It was a 
bride^s traveling costume, I suppose.” 

“ Yes. That is, I presume so. I know that it 
was all right and suitable to the occasion, but I 
don’t remember much about it. I was think- 
ing too much of the woman in the gown to 
notice the gown itself.” 

“Cannot you tell the color?” 

“ It was a dark one. Fm sure it was a dark 
one, but colors are not much in my line. I 
know she looked well — they can tell you 
about it at the house. All that I distinctly 
remember is the veil she had wound so tightly 
around her face and hat to keep the rice out of 
her hair that I could not get one glimpse of her 
features. All nonsense that veil, especially 
when I had promised not to address her or even 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


17 


to touch her in the cab. And she wore it into 
the ofhce. If it had not been for that I might 
have foreseen her intention in time to prevent 
it.^’ 

Perhaps she knew that.’’ 

“ It looks as if she did.” 

“ Which means that she was meditating flight 
from the first.” 

^^From the time she saw that man,” Mr. 
Ransom corrected. 

“Just so; from the time she left her uncle’s 
house. Your wife is a wj nan of means, I 
believe.” 

“ Yes, unfortunately.” 

“ Why unfortunately? ” 

“ It makes her independen . and offers a lure 
to irresponsible wretches like him.” 

“ Her fortune is large, then?” 

“Very large; larger than my own.” 

Every one knew Mr. Ransom to be a million- 
aire. 

“ Left her by her father?” 

“No, by some great-uncle, I believe, who 
made his fortune in the Klondike.” 

“And entirely under her own control?” 

“ Entirely so.” 

“Who is her man of business?” 


18 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


Edward Harper, of —Wall Street/^ 

“ He^s your man. He^ll know sooner or 
later where she is.^^ 

^^Yes, but later won^t do. I must know 
to-night; or, if that is impossible, to-morrow. 
Were it not for the mortification it would cause 
her I should beg you to put on all your force and 
ransack the city for this bride of five hours. 
But such publicity is too shocking. I should 
like to give her a day to reconsider her treat- 
ment of me. She cannot mean to leave me for 
good. She has too much self-respect; to say 
nothing of her very positive and not to be ques- 
tioned affection for myself.” 

The detective looked thoughtful. The prob- 
lem had its difficulties. 

Are those hers?” he asked at last, pointing 
to the two trunks he saw standing against the 
wall. 

“ Yes. I had them brought up, in the hope 
that she had slipped away on some foolish 
errand or other and would yet come back.” 

^^By their heft I judge them to be full; how 
about her hand-bag?” 

She had only a small bag and an umbrella. 
They are both here.” 

How’s that?” 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


19 


"The colored boy took them at the door. 
She went away with nothing in her hands. 

Gerridge glanced at the bag Mr. Ransom had 
pointed out, fingered it, then asked the young 
husband to open it. 

He did so. The usual articles and indis- 
pensable adjuncts of a nice woman’s toilet met 
their eyes. Also a pocketbook containing con- 
siderable money and a case holding more than 
one valuable jewel. 

The eyes of the officer and manager met in ill 
disguised alarm. 

" She must have been under the most violent 
excitement to slip away without these,” sug- 
gested the former. " Fd better be at work. 
Give me two hours,” were his parting words to 
Mr. Ransom. " By that time Fll either be back 
or telephone you. You had better stay here; 
she may return. Though I don’t think that 
likely,” he muttered as he passed the manager. 

At the door he stopped. " You can’t tell me 
the color of that veil?” 

" No.” 

" Look about the room, sir. There’s lots of 
colors in the furniture and hangings. Don’t 
you see one somewhere that reminds you of her 
veil or even of her dress?” 


20 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


The miserable bridegroom looked up from 
the bag into which he was still staring and, 
glancing slowly around him, finally pointed 
at a chair upholstered in brown and impul- 
sively said: 

“The veil was like that; I remember now. 
Brown, isnT it? a dark brown? 

“Yes. And the dress?’^ 

“ I canT tell you a thing about the dress. 
But her gloves — I remember something about 
them. They were so tight they gaped open at 
the wrist. Her hands looked quite disfigured. 
I wondered that so sensible a woman should 
buy gloves at least two sizes too small for her. 
I think she was ashamed of them herself, for 
she tried to hide them after she saw me look- 
ing.” 

“ This was in the cab?” 

“ Yes.” 

“Where you didnT speak a word?” 

“ Not a word.” 

“Though she seemed so very much cut up?” 

“ No, she didnT seem cut up; only tired.” 

“How tired?” 

“She sat with her head pressed against the 
side of the cab.” 

“And a little turned away?” 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


21 


“ As if she shrank from you?’^ 

“ A little so/^ 

Did she brighten when the carriage stopped? 

She started upright.” 

" Did you help her out?” 

No, I had promised not to touch her.” 

She jumped out after you?” 

“Yes.” 

“ And never spoke?” 

“Not a word.” 

Gerridge opened the door, motioned for the 
manager to follow, and, once in the hall, re- 
marked to that gentleman: 

“ I should like to see the boy who took her 
bag and was with them when she slipped away.” 


CHAPTER II 


THE LADY IN NUMBER THREE 

The boy was soon found and proved to be 
more observing in matters of dress than Mr. 
Ransom. He described with apparent accuracy 
both the color and cut of the garments worn 
by the lady who had flitted away so mysteri- 
ously. The former was brown, all brown; and 
the latter was of the tailor-made variety, very 
natty and becoming. “What you would call 
^ swell,’’’ was the comment, “ if her walk hadn’t 
spoiled the hang of it. How she did walk! 
Her shoes must have hurt her most uncommon. 
I never did see any one hobble so.” 

“How’s that? She hobbled, and her hus- 
band didn’t notice it?” 

“ Oh, he had hurried on ahead. She was be- 
hind him, and she walked like this.” 

The pantomime was highly expressive. 

“ That’s a point,” muttered Gerridge. Then 
with a sharp look at the boy : “ Where were you 
that you didn’t notice her when she slipped off?” 

“ Oh, but I did, sir. I was waiting for the 
clerk to give me the key, when I saw her step 
back from the gentleman’s side and, looking 
quickly round to see if any one was noticing 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


27 


face for a far deeper purpose than to ward off 
rice” 

Mr. Ransom staggered back against the table 
before which he had been standing. The blow 
was an overwhelming one. 

Who is this woman?” he demanded. “She 
came from Mr. Fulton^s house. More than 
that, from my wife^s room. What is her name 
and what did she mean by such an out- 
rage?” 

“ Her name is Bella Burton, and she is your 
wife^s confidential maid. As for the meaning 
of this outrage, it will take more than two hours 
to ferret out that. I can only give you the 
single fact Fve mentioned.” 

“And Mrs. Ransom?” 

“ She left the house at the same moment you 
did; you and Miss Burton. Only she went by 
the basement door.” 

“She? She?” 

“ Dressed in her maid^s clothes. Oh, you^ll 
have to hear worse things than that before we^re 
out of this muddle. If you won^t mind a bit of 
advice from a man of experience, I would sug- 
gest that you take things easy. IFs the only 
way.” 

Shocked into silence by this cold-blooded 


28 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


philosophy, Mr. Ransom controlled both his 
anger and his humiliation; but he could not 
control his surprise. 

What does it mean?’’ he murmured to him- 
self. “ What does it all mean f ” 


CHAPTER III 

KNOWS THE WORD’’ 

The next moment the doubt natural to the 
occasion asserted itself. 

“ How do you know all this? You state the 
impossible. Explain yourself.” 

Gerridge was only too willing to do so. 

“ I have just come from Mr. Fulton’s house,” 
said he. Inquiries there elicited the facts 
which have so startled you. Neither Mr. Fulton 
nor his wife meant to deceive you. They knew 
nothing, suspected nothing of what took place, 
and you have no cause to blame them. It was 
all a plot between the two women.” 

But how — why — ” 

You see, I had a fact to go upon. You had 
noticed that your so-called bride’s gloves did 
not fit her; the boy below, that her shoes were 
so tight she hobbled. That set me thinking. 
A woman of Mrs. Ransom’s experience and 
judgment would not be apt to make a mistake 
in two such important particulars; which, taken 


30 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


with the veil and the promise she exacted from 
you not to address or touch her during your 
short ride to the hotel, led me to point my in- 
quiries so that I soon found out that your wife 
had had the assistance of another woman in 
getting ready for her journey and that this 
woman was her own maid who had been with 
her for a long time, and had always given 
evidence of an especial attachment for her. Ask- 
ing about this girbs height and general appear- 
ance (for the possibility of a substitution was 
already in my mind), I found that she was of 
slight figure and good carriage, and that her 
age was not far removed from that of her young 
mistress. This made the substitution I have 
mentioned feasible, and when I was told that 
she was seen taking her hat and bonnet into 
the bride’s room, and, though not expected to 
leave till the next morning, had slid away from 
the house by the basement door at the same 
moment her mistress appeared on the front 
steps, my suspicions became so confirmed that 
I asked how this girl looked, in the hope that 
you would be able to recognize her, through the 
description, as the woman you had seen sitting 
in Reception-room No. 3. But to my surprise, 
Mrs. Fulton had what was better than any 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


31 


description, the girPs picture. This has sim- 
plified matters very much. By it you have 
been able to identify the woman who attempted 
to mislead you in the reception-room, and I 
the person who rode here with you from Mr. 
Fulton^s house. WasnT she dressed in brown? 
DidnT you notice a similarity in her appear- 
ance to that of the very lady you were then 
seeking? 

I did not observe. Her face was all I saw. 
She was looking directly at me as I stepped 
into the room.” 

I see. She had taken off her veil and 
trusted to your attention being caught by her 
strange features, — as it was. But that dress 
was brown; Fm sure of it. She was the very 
woman. Otherwise the mystery is impenetrable. 
A deep plot, Mr. Ransom; one that should 
prove to you that Mrs. Ransom^s motive in 
leaving you was of a very serious character. 
Do you wish that motive probed to the bottom? 
I cannot do it without publicity. Are you 
willing to incur that publicity?” 

I must.” Mr. Ransom had risen in great 
excitement. Nothing can hide the fact that 
my bride left me on our wedding-day. It only 
remains now to show that she did it under an 


32 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


influence which robbed her of her own will; 
an influence from which she shrank even while 
succumbing to it. I can show her no greater 
kindness, and I am not afraid of the result. I 
have perfect confidence in her integrity” — he 
hesitated, then added with strong conviction — 
^^and in her love.” 

The detective hid his surprise. He could 
not understand this confidence. But then he 
knew nothing of the memories which lay back 
of it. Not to him could this grievously humili- 
ated and disappointed man reveal the secrets 
of a courtship which had fixed his heart on this 
one woman, and aroused in him such trust that 
even this uncalled-for outrage to his pride and 
affection had not been able to shake it. Such 
secrets are sacred; but the reflection of his trust 
was strong on his face as he repeated : 

“ Perfect confidence, Mr. Gerridge. What- 
ever may have drawn Mrs. Ransom from my 
side, it was not lack of affection, or any doubt 
of my sincerity or undivided attachment to 
herself.” 

The detective may not have been entirely 
convinced on the first point, but he was dis- 
cretion itself, and responded quite cheerfully 
with an emphatic: 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


33 


"Very well. You still want me to find her. 
I will do my best, sir; but first, cannot you help 
me with a suggestion or two?’’ 

"I?” 

"There must be some clew to so sudden a 
freak on the part of a young and beautiful 
woman, who, I have taken pains to learn, has 
not only a clean record but a reputation for 
good sense. The Fultons cannot supply it. 
She has lived a seemingly open and happy life 
in their house, and the mystery is as great to 
them as to you. But you, as her lover and now 
her husband, must have been favored with 
confidences not given to others. Cannot you 
recall one likely to put us on the right track? 
Some fact prior to the events of to-day, I mean; 
some fact connected with her past life; before 
she went to live with the Fultons?” 

" No. Yet let me think; let me think.” Mr. 
Ransom dropped his face into his hands and 
sat for a momen" silent. When he looked up 
again, the dete ive perceived that the affair 
was hopeless sr lar as he was concerned. " No,” 
he repeated, this time with unmistakable em- 
phasis, " she has always appeared buoyant and 
untrammeled. But then I have only known 
her six months.” 




THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


Tell me her history so far as you know it. 
What do you know of her life previous to your 
meeting her?’’ 

“ It was a very simple one. She had a coun- 
try bringing up, having been born in a small 
village in Connecticut. She was one of three 
children and the only one who has survived; 
her sister, who was her twin, died when she 
was a small child, and a brother some five years 
ago. Her fortune was willed her, as I have 
already told you, by a great-uncle. It is en- 
tirely in her own hands. Left an orphan early, 
she lived first with her brother; then when he 
died, with one relative after another, till lastly 
she settled down with the Fultons. I know 
of no secret in her life, no entanglement, not 
even of any prior engagements. Yet that man 
with the twisted jaw was not unknown to her, 
and if he is a relative, as she said, you should 
have no difficulty in locating him.” 

“ I have a man on his track/’ Gerridge replied. 

And one on the girl’s too; I mean, of course, 
Bela Burton’s. They will report here up to 
twelve o’clock to-night. It is now half-past 
eleven. We should hear from one or the other 
soon.” 

And my wife?” 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


35 


A description of the clothing she wore has 
gone out. We may hear from it. But I doubt 
if we do to-night unless she has rejoined her 
maid or the man with a scar. Somehow I 
think she will join the girl. But it's hard to 
tell yet." 

Mr. Ransom could hardly control his im- 
patience. “And I must sit helpless here!" he 
exclaimed. “I who have so much at stake!" 

The detective evidently thought the occasion 
called for whatever comfort it was in his power 
to bestow. 

“ Yes," said he. “ For it is here she will seek 
you if she takes a notion to return. But woman 
is an uncertain quantity," he dryly added. 

At that moment the telephone bell rang. 
Mr. Ransom leaped to answer; but the call was 
only an anxious one from the Fultons, who 
wanted to know what news. He answered as 
best he could, and was recrossing disconsolately 
to his chair when voices rose in the hall, and a 
man was ushered in, whom Gerridge imme- 
diately introduced as Mr. Sims. 

A runner — and with news! Mr. Ransom, 
summoning up his courage, waited for the 
inevitable question and reply. They came 
quickly enough. 


36 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


What have you got? Have you found the 
man?” 

“Yes. And the lady^s been to see him; that 
is, if the description of her togs was cor- 
rect.” 

“He means Mrs. Ransom,” explained Ger- 
ridge. Then, as he marked his client’s struggle 
for composure, he quietly asked, “ A lady in a 
dark green suit with yellowish furs and a blue 
veil over her hat?” 

“ That’s the ticket!” 

“ The clothes worn by the woman who went 
out of the basement door, Mr. Ransom.” 

The latter turned sharply aside. The shame 
of the thing was becoming intolerable. 

“ And this woman wearing those yellow furs 
and the blue veil visited the man of the broken 
jaw?” inquired Gerridge. 

“Yes, sir.” 

“ When?” 

“About six this afternoon.” 

“And where?” 

“At the hotel St. Denis where I have since 
tracked him.” 

“ How long did she stay?” 

“ About an hour.” 

“ In the parlor or — ” 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


37 


"In the parlor. They had a great deal to 
say. More than one noticed them, but no one 
heard anything. They talked very low but 
they meant business.’^ 

" Where is this man now?’’ 

" At the same place. He has engaged a room 
there.” 

"The man with the twisted jaw?” 

"Yes.” 

"Under what name?” 

"Hugh Porter.” 

" Ah, it was Hazen only five hours ago,” 
muttered Ransom. " Porter, did you say? I’ll 
have a talk with this Porter at once.” 

" I think not to-night,” put in the detective, 
with the mingled authority and deference 
natural to one of his kind. "To-morrow, per- 
haps, but to-night it would only provoke 
scandal;” 

This was certainly true, but Mr. Ransom 
was not an easy man to dominate. 

" I must see him before I sleep,” he insisted. 
"A single word may solve this mystery. He 
has the word. I’d be a fool to let the night 
go by — Ah! what’s that?” 

The telephone bell had rung again. A mes- 
sageTrom the oSice this time. A note had just 


38 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


been handed in for Mr. Ransom; should they 
send it up? 

Gerridge was at the ’phone. 

Instantly/’ he shouted down, and be sure 
you hold the messenger. It may be from your 
lady,” he remarked to Mr. Ransom. Stranger 
things than that have happened.” 

Mr. Ransom reeled to the door, opened it and 
stood waiting. The two detectives exchanged 
glances. What might not that note contain! 

Mr. Ransom opened it in the hall. When he 
came back into the room, his hand was shaking 
and his face looked drawn and pale. But he 
showed no further disposition to go out. In- 
stead, he sank into a chair, with a motion of 
dismissal to the two detectives. 

Question the boy who brought this,” said 
he. It is from Mrs. Ransom; written, as 
you see, at the St. Denis. She bids me farewell 
for a time, but does not favor me with any 
explanations. She cannot do differently, she 
says, and asks me to trust her and wait. Not 
very encouraging to sleep on; but it’s something. 
She has not entirely forsaken me.” 

Gerridge with a shrug turned sharply towards 
the door. “ I take it that you wouldn’t object 
to knowing all the messenger can tell you?” 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


39 


“ No, no. Question him. Find out whether 
she gave this to him with her own hand.’’ 

Gerridge obeyed this injunction, but was 
told in reply that the note had been given him 
to deliver by a clerk in the hotel lobby. He 
could tell nothing about the lady. 

This was unsatisfactory enough; but the man 
who had influenced her to this step had been 
placed under surveillance. To-morrow they 
would question him; the mystery was not 
without a promise of solution. So Gerridge 
felt; but not Mr. Ransom; for at the end of the 
lines whose purport he had just communicated 
to the detective were these few, significant 
words : 

Make no move to find me. If you love me 
well enough to wait in silence for developments, 
happiness may yet be ours.” 


CHAPTER IV 


MR. RANSOM WAITS 

Gerridge rose early, primed, as he said to 
himself, for business. But to his great dis- 
appointment he found Mr. Ransom in a frame 
of mind which precluded action. Indeed, that 
gentleman looked greatly changed. He not 
only gave evidence of a sleepless night but 
showed none of the spirit of the previous evening, 
and hesitated quite painfully when Gerridge 
asked him if he did not intend to go ahead 
with the interview they had promised them- 
selves. 

“That^s as it may be,^^ was the hesitating 
reply. “ I hardly think that I shall visit the 
man you mean this morning. He interests me 
and I hope that none of his movements will 
escape you. But Pm not ready to talk to 
him. I prefer to wait a little; to give my wife 
a chance. I should feel better, and have less 
to forget.’^ 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


41 


^^Just as you say/^ returned the detective 
stiffly. ^^He^s under our thumb at present, 
I can’t tell when he may wriggle out.” 

“Not while your eye’s on him. And your 
eye won’t leave him as long as you have con- 
fidence in the reward I’ve promised you.” 

“Perhaps not; but you take the life out of 
me. Last night you were too hot; this morn- 
ing you are too cold. But it’s not for me to 
complain. You know where to find me when 
you want me.” And without more ado the 
detective went out. 

Mr. Ransom remained alone and in no en- 
viable frame of mind. He was distrustful of 
himself, distrustful of the man who had made 
all this trouble, and distrustful of her, though 
he would not acknowledge it. Every baser 
instinct in him drove him to the meeting he 
declined. To see the man — to force from 
him the truth, seemed the only rational thing 
to do. But the final words of his wife’s letter 
stood in his way. She had advised patience. 
If patience would clear the situation and bring 
him the result he so ardently desired, then he 
would be patient — that is, for a day; he did 
not promise to wait longer. Yes, he would 
give her a day. That was time enough for a 


42 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


man suffering on the rack of such an intolerable 
suspense — one day. 

But even that day did not pass without 
breaks in his mood and more than one walk in 
the direction of the St. Denis Hotel. If Ger- 
ridge^s eye was on him as well as on the special 
object of his surveillance, he must have smiled, 
more than once, at the restless flittings of his 
client about the forbidden spot. In the even- 
ing it was the same, but the next morning he 
remained steadfastly at his hotel. He had laid 
out his future course in these words : “ I will 
extend the time to three, days; then if I do not 
hear from her I will get that wry-necked fellow 
by the throat and twist an explanation from 
him.’^ But the three days passed and he found 
the situation unchanged. Then he set as his 
limit the end of the week, but before the full 
time had elapsed he was advised by Gerridge 
that he himself was being followed in his turn 
by a couple of private detectives; and while 
still under the agitation of this discovery was 
further disconcerted by having the following 
communication thrust into his hand in the 
open street by a young woman who succeeded 
in losing herself in the crowd before he had 
got so much as a good look at her. 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


43 


You can judge of his amazement as he read 
the few lines it contained. 

Read the papers to-night and forget the 
stranger at the St. Denis. 

That was all. But the writing was hers. 
The hours passed slowly till the papers were 
cried in the street. What Mr. Ransom read 
in them increased his astonishment, I might 
say his anxiety. It was a paragraph about his 
wife, an almost incredible one, running thus: 

A strange explanation is given of the dis- 
appearance of Mrs. Roger Ransom on her wed- 
ding-day. As our readers will remember, she 
accompanied her husband to the hotel, but 
managed to slip away and leave the house 
while he still stood at the desk. This act, for 
which nothing in her previous conduct has in 
any way prepared her friends, is now said to 
have been due to the shock of hearing, some 
time during her wedding-day, that a sister 
whom she had supposed dead was really alive 
and in circumstances of almost degrading 
poverty. As this sister had been her own twin 
the effect upon her mind was very serious. To 


44 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


find and rescue this sister she left her newly 
made husband in the surreptitious manner 
already recorded in the papers. That she is 
not fully herself is shown by her continued 
secrecy as to her whereabouts. All that she 
has been willing to admit to the two persons 
she has so far taken into her confidence — her 
husband and the agent who conducts her affairs 
— is that she has found her sister and cannot 
leave her. Why, she does not state. The 
case is certainly a curious one and Mr. Ran- 
som has the sympathy of all his friends. 

Confused, and in a state of mind bordering 
on frenzy, Mr. Ransom returned to the hotel 
and sought refuge in his own room. He put 
no confidence in what he had just read; he 
regarded it as a newspaper story and a great 
fake; but she had bid him read it, and this fact 
in itself was very disturbing. For how could 
she have known about it if she had not been 
its author, and if she was its author, what pur- 
pose had she expected it to serve? 

He was still debating this question when he 
reached his own room. On the floor, a little 
way from the sill, lay a letter. It had been 
thrust under the door during his absence. 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


45 


Lifting it in some trepidation, he cast a glance 
at its inscription and sank staggering into the 
nearest chair, asking himself if he had the 
courage to open and read it. For the hand- 
writing, like that of the note handed him in 
the street, was Georgian's, and he felt himself 
in a maze concerning her which made every- 
thing in her connection seem dreamlike and 
unreal. It was not long, however, before he 
had mastered its contents. They were strange 
enough, as this transcription of them will show. 

You have seen what has happened to me, 
but you cannot understand how I feel. She 
looks exactly like me. It is that which makes 
the world eddy about me. I cannot get used 
to it. It is like seeing my own reflected image 
step from the mirror and walk about doing 
things. Two of us, Roger, two! If you saw 
her you would call her Georgian. And she 
says that she knows yoUj admires you! and she 
says it in my voice! I try to shut my ears, but 
I hear her saying it even when her lips do not 
move. She is as ignorant as she is afflicted 
and I cannot leave her. She cannot hear a 
sound, though she can talk well enough about 
what is going on in her own mind, and she is so 


46 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


wayward and uncertain of temper, owing to 
her ignorance and her difficulty in understand- 
ing me, that I don’t know what she would do 
if once let out of my sight. I love you — I 
love you — but I must stay right here. 

Your affectionate and most unhappy 

Georgian. 

The sheet with its tear-stained lines fell 
from his grasp. Then he caught it up again 
and looked carefully at the signature. It was 
his wife’s without doubt. Then he studied 
the rest of the writing and compared it with 
that of the note which had been thrust into 
his hands earlier in the day. There was no 
difference between them except that there 
were evidences of faltering in the latter, not 
noticeable in the earlier communication. As 
he noted these tokens of weakness or suffering, 
he caught up the telephone receiver in good 
earnest and called out Gerridge’s number. 
When the detective answered, he shouted 
back: 

Have you read the evening papers? If you 
haven’t, do so at once; then come directly to 
me. It’s business now and no mistake; and our 
first visit shall be on the fellow at the St. Denis.” 


CHAPTER V 


IN CORRIDOR AND IN ROOM 

Three quarters of an hour later Mr. Ran- 
som and Gerridge stood in close conference 
before the last mentioned hotel. The former 
was peremptory in what he had to say. 

“ I havenT a particle of confidence in this 
newspaper story/^ he declared. I havenT 
much confidence in her letter. It is this man 
who is working us. He has a hold on her and 
has given her this cock and bull story to tell. 
A sister! A twin sister come to light after 
fifteen years of supposed burial! I find the 
circumstance entirely too romantic. Nor does 
an explanation of this nature fit the conditions. 
She was happy before she saw him in the 
church. He isnT her twin sister. I tell you 
the game is a deep one and she is the sufferer. 
Her letters betray more than a disturbed mind; 
they betray a disturbed brain. That man is the 
cause and I mean to wring his secret from him. 
You are sure of his being still in the house 


48 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


''He was early this morning. He has lived 
a very quiet life these last few days, the life of 
one waiting. He has not even had visitors, 
after that one interview he held with your wife. 
I have kept careful watch on him. Though a 
suspected character, he has done nothing sus- 
picious while Fve had him under my eye/^ 
That^s all right and I thank you, Gerridge; 
but it doesnT shake my opinion as to his being 
the moving power in this fraud. For fraud it 
is and no mistake. Of that I am fully con- 
vinced. Shall we go up? I want to surprise 
him in his own room where he cannot slip away 
or back out.” 

Leave that business to me; Fll manage it. 
If you want to see him in his room, you 
shall.” 

But this time the detective counted without 
his host. Mr. Porter was not in his room but in 
one of the halls. They encountered him as 
they left the elevator. He was standing read- 
ing a newspaper. The disfigured jaw could 
not be mistaken. They stopped where they 
were and looked at him. 

He was intent, absorbed. As they watched, 
they saw his hands close convulsively on the 
sheet he was holding, while his lips muttered 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


49 


some words that made the detective look hard 
at his companion. 

^^Did you hear?^^ he cautiously inquired, as 
Mr. Ransom stood hesitating, not knowing 
whether to address the man or not. 

^^No; what did he say? Do you suppose he 
is reading that paragraph?’^ 

“ I haven^t a doubt of it; and his words were, 
^Here’s a damned lie!^ — very much like your 
own, sir.” 

Mr. Ransom drew the detective a few steps 
down the corridor. 

“He said that?” 

“ Yes, I heard him distinctly.” 

“Then my theory is all wrong. This man 
didnT provide her with this imaginary twin 
sister.” 

“ Evidently not.” 

“And is as surprised as we are.” 

“ And about as much put out. Look at him! 
Nothing yellow there! We shall have to go 
easy with him.” 

Mr. Ransom looked and felt a recoil of more 
than ordinary dislike for the man. The latter 
had put the paper in his pocket and was 
coming their way. His face, once possibly 
handsome, for his eyes and forehead were con- 


50 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


spicuously fine, showed a distortion quite apart 
from that given by his physical disfigurement. 
He was not simply angry but in a mental and 
moral rage, and it made him more than hideous; 
it made him appalling. Yet he said nothing 
and moved along very quietly, making, to all 
appearance, for his room. Would he notice 
them as he went by? It did not seem likely. 
Instinctively they had stepped to one side, 
and Mr. Ransom’s face was in the shadow. 
To both it had seemed better not to accost him 
while he was in this mood. They would see 
him later. 

But this was not to be. Some instinct made 
him turn, and Mr. Ransom, recognizing his 
opportunity, stepped forward and addressed 
him by the name under which he had intro- 
duced himself at the reception; that of his 
wife’s family, Hazen. 

The effect was startling. Instead of increas- 
ing his anger, as the detective had naturally 
expected, it appeared to have the contrary 
effect, for every vestige of passion immediately 
disappeared from his face, leaving only its 
natural disfigurement to plead against him. 
He approached them, and Ransom, at least, 
was conscious of a revulsion of feeling in his 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


51 


favor, there was such restraint and yet such 
undoubted power in his strange and peculiar 
personality. 

“You know me?’’ said he, darting a keen 
and comprehensive look from one to the other. 

“We should like a few words with you,” 
ventmed Gerridge. “ This gentleman thinks 
you can give him very valuable information 
about a person he is greatly interested in.” 

“He is mistaken.” The words came quick 
and decisive in a not unmelodious voice. “ I 
am a stranger in New York; a stranger in this 
country. I have few, if any, acquaintances.” 

“ You have one.” 

It was now Mr. Ransom’s turn. 

“A man with no acquaintances does not 
attend weddings; certainly not wedding re- 
ceptions. I have seen you at one, my own. 
Do you not recognize me, Mr. Hazen?” 

A twitch of surprise, not even Ransom could 
call it alarm, drew his mouth still further 
towards his ear; but his manner hardly altered 
and it was in the same affable tone that he 
replied : 

“You must pardon my short-sightedness. 
I did not recognize you, Mr. Ransom.” 

“ Did not want to,” muttered Gerridge, 


52 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


satisfied in his own mind that this man was only 
deterred by his marked and unmistakable 
physiognomy from denying the acquaintance- 
ship just advanced. 

“Your congratulations did not produce the 
desired effect,” continued Mr. Ransom. “My 
happiness was short lived. Perhaps you knew 
its uncertain tenure when you wished me joy. 
I remember that your tone lacked sincerity.” 

It was a direct attack. Whether a wise one 
or not remained to be seen. Gerridge watched 
the unfolding drama with interest. 

“ I have reason to think,” proceeded Mr. 
Ransom, “that the unhappy termination of 
that day’s felicities were in a measure due to 
you. You seem to know my bride very well; 
much too well for her happiness or mine.” 

“We will argue that question in my room,” 
was the unmoved reply. “The open hall is 
quite unsuited to a conversation of this nature. 
Now,” said he, turning upon them when they 
were in the privacy of his small but not uncom- 
fortable apartment, “ you will be kind enough 
to repeat what you just said. I wish to thor- 
oughly understand you.” 

“ You have the right,” returned Mr. Ransom, 
controlling himself under the detective’s eye. 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


53 


I said that your presence at this wedding 
seemed to disturb my wife, which fact, consider- 
ing the after occurrences of the day, strikes me 
as important enough for discussion. Are you 
willing to discuss it affably and fairly?^’ 

^^May I ask who your companion is?’^ in- 
quired the other, with a slight inclination 
towards Gerridge. 

A friend; one who is in my confidence.’^ 

Then I will answer you without any further 
hesitation. My presence may have disturbed 
your wife, it very likely did, but I was not to 
blame for that. No man is to blame for the 
bad effects of an unfortunate accident.” 

Oh, I don’t mean that,” Mr. Ransom has- 
tened to protest. ^^The cause of her very 
evident agitation was not personal. It had a 
deeper root than that. It led, or so I believe, 
to her flight from a love she cherished, at a 
moment when our mutual life seemed about to 
begin.” 

The impassive, I might almost say set fea- 
tures of this man of violent passions but remark- 
able self-restraint failed to relax or give any 
token of the feelings with which he listened to 
this attack. 

^^Then the news given of your wife in the 


54 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


papers to-night is false,” was his quiet retort. 

It professes to give a distinct, if somewhat 
fantastic, reason for her flight. A reason totally 
different from the one you suggest.” 

A reason you don^t believe in?” 

Certainly not. It is too bizarre.” 

I share your incredulity. That is why I 
seek the truth from you rather than from the 
columns of a newspaper. And you owe me 
this truth. You have broken up my life.” 

“I? That^s a strange accusation you make, 
Mr. Ransom.” 

Possibly. But it^s one which strikes hard 
on your conscience, for all that. This is evi- 
dent enough even to a stranger like myself. I 
am convinced that if you had not come into her 
life she would have been at my side to-day. 
Now, who are you? She told me you were a 
relative.” 

“ She told you the truth; I am. Her nearest 
relative. The story in the paper has a cer- 
tain amount of truth in it. Her brother, not 
her sister, has come back from the grave. I 
am that brother. She was once devoted to 
me.” 

^^You are — ” 

^^Yes. Oh, therein be no difficulty in my 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


55 


proving this relationship. I have evidence upon 
evidence of the fact right in this room with me; 
evidence much more convincing and far less 
disputable than this surprising twin can bring 
forward if her identity is questioned. Georgian 
had a twin sister, but she was buried years ago. 
I was never buried. I simply did not return 
from a well-known and dangerous voyage. 
The struggle I nad for life — you cannot want 
the details now — has left its indelible impress 
in the scar which has turned me from a person- 
able man into what some people might call a 
monstrosity. And it is this scar which has 
kept me so long from home and country. It 
has taken me four years to make up my mind 
to face again my family and friends. And 
now that I have, I find that it would have been 
better for us all if I had stayed away. Georgian 
saw me and her mind wavered. In no other 
way can I account for her wild behavior since 
that hour. That is all I have to say, sir. I 
think I am almost as much an object of pity 
as yourself.’^ 

And for a moment he appeared to be so, not 
only to Gerridge, but to Mr. Ransom himself. 
Then something in the man — his unnatural 
coldness, the purpose which made itself felt 


56 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


through all his self-restraint — reawakened Mr. 
Ransom’s distrust and led him to say: 

“ Your complaint is natural. If you are 
Mrs. Ransom’s brother, there should be sym- 
pathy between us and not antagonism. But 
I feel only antagonism. Why is this?” 

A shrug, followed by an odd smile. 

“You should be able to account for that on 
very reasonable grounds,” said he. “ I do not 
expect much mercy from strangers. It is hard 
to make your good intentions felt through such 
a distorted medium as my expression has now 
become.” 

“ Mrs. Ransom has been here,” Ransom sud- 
denly launched forth. “Within two hours of 
your encounter under Mr. Fulton’s roof, she 
was talking with you in this hotel. I have 
proof positive of that, sir.” 

“ I have no wish to deny the fact,” was the 
steady answer. “She did come here and we 
had a talk; it was necessary; I wanted 
money.” 

The last phrase was uttered with such grim 
determination that the exclamation which had 
risen to Mr. Ransom’s lips died in a conflict 
of feeling which forbade any rejoinder that 
savored of sarcasm. Hazen, however, must 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


57 


have noted his first look, for he added with an 
air of haughty apology : 

repeat that we were once very fond of 
each other/’ 

Ransom felt his perplexities growing with 
every moment he talked with this man. He 
remembered the money which both he and 
Gerridge had seen in her bag, — an amount too 
large for her to have retained very much on 
her person, — and following the instinct of 
the moment, he remarked : 

Mrs. Ransom is not the woman to hesitate 
when a person she loves makes an appeal for 
money. She handed you immediately a large 
sum, I have no doubt.” 

“ She wrote me out a check,” was the simple 
but cold answer. 

Mr. Ransom felt the failure of his attempt 
and stole a glance at Gerridge. 

The doubtful smile he received was not very 
encouraging. The same thought had evidently 
struck both. The money in the bag was a 
blind — she had carried her check-book with 
her and so could draw on her account for 
whatever she wished. But under what name? 
Her maiden one or his? Ransom determined 
to find out. 


58 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


I do not begrudge you the money/^ said he, 
“but Mrs. Ransom^s signature had changed a 
few hours previous to her making out this 
check. Did she remember this?’’ 

“ She signed her married name promising to 
notify the bank at once.” 

“And you cashed the check?” 

“No, sir; I am not in such immediate need 
of money as that. I have it still, but I shall 
endeavor to cash it to-morrow. Some ques- 
tion may come up as to her sanity, and I do 
not choose to lose the only money she has ever 
been in a position to give me.” 

“Mr. Hazen, you harp on the irresponsible 
condition of her mind. Did you see any tokens 
of this in the interview you had together?” 

“No; she seemed sane enough then; a little 
shocked and troubled, but quite sane.” 

“You knew that she had stolen away from 
me — that she had resorted to a most un- 
worthy subterfuge in order to hold this con- 
versation with you?’^ 

“No; I had asked her to come, and on that 
very afternoon if possible, but I never knew 
what means she took for doing so; I didn’t ask 
and she didn’t say.” 

“ But she talked of her marriage? She must 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


59 


have said something about an event which is 
usually considered the greatest in a woman^s 
life/’ 

^^Yes, she spoke of it.” 

^^And of me?” 

“Yes, she spoke of you.” 

“ And in what terms? I cannot refrain from 
asking you, Mr. Hazen, I am in such ignorance 
as to her real attitude towards me; her con- 
duct is so mysterious; the reasons she gives for 
it so puerile.” 

“She said nothing against you or her mar- 
riage. She mentioned both, but not in a manner 
that would add to your or my knowledge of 
her intentions. My sister disappointed me, sir. 
She was much less open than I wished. All 
that I could make out of her manner and con- 
versation was the overpowering shock she felt 
at seeing me again and seeing me so changed. 
She didn’t even tell me when and where we 
might meet again. When she left, she wgs as 
much lost to me as she was to you, and I am 
no less interested in finding her than you are 
yourself. I had no idea she did not mean to 
return to you when she went away from this 
hotel.” 

Mr. Ransom sprang upright in an agitation 


60 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


the other may have shared, but of which he 
gave no token. 

“ Do you mean to say,’^ he asked, that you 
cannot tell me where the woman you call your 
sister is now?’’ 

^^No more than you can give me the same 
necessary information in regard to your wife. 
I am waiting like yourself to hear from her — 
and waiting with as little hope.” 

Had he seen Ransom’s hand close convul- 
sively over the pocket in which her few strange 
words to him were lying, that a slight tinge of 
sarcasm gave edge to the last four words? 

^^But this is not like my wife,” protested 
Ransom, hesitating to accuse the other of 
falsehood, yet evidently doubting him from the 
bottom of his heart. Why deceive us both? 
She was never a disingenuous woman.” 

“ In childhood she had her incomprehensible 
moments,” observed Hazen, with an ambiguous 
lift of his shoulders; then, as Ransom made an 
impatient move, added with steady composure : 

I have candidly answered all your questions 
whether agreeable or otherwise, and the fact 
that I am as much shocked as yourself by these 
mad and totally incredible statements of hers 
about a newly recovered sister should prove 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


61 


to you that she is not following any lead of 
mine in this dissemination of a bare-faced 
falsehood/^ 

There was truth in this which both Mr. Ran- 
som and Gerridge felt obliged to own. Yet 
they were not satisfied, even after Mr. Hazen, 
almost against Mr. Ransom^s will, had estab- 
lished his claims to the relationship he pro- 
fessed, by various well-attested documents he 
had at hand. Instinct could not be juggled 
with, nor could Ransom help feeling that the 
mystery in which he found himself entangled 
had been deepened rather than dispelled by 
the confidences of this new brother-in-law. 

^^The maze is at its thickest,” he remarked 
as he left a few minutes later with the perplexed 
Gerridge. How shall I settle this new ques- 
tion? By what means and through whose aid 
can I gain an interview with my wife?” 


CHAPTER VI 


THE LAWYER 

The answer was an unexpectedly sensible 
one. 

“ Hunt up her man of business and see what 
he can do for you. She cannot get along 
without money; nor could that statement of 
hers have got into the papers without some- 
body's assistance. Since she did not get it 
from the fellow we have just left, she must have 
had it from the only other person she would 
dare confide in.^^ 

Ransom answered by immediately hailing a 
down-town car. 

The interview which followed was certainly 
a remarkable one. At first Mr. Harper would 
say nothing, declaring that his relations with 
Mrs. Ransom were of a purely business and 
confidential nature. But by degrees, moved 
by the persuasive influence of Mr. Ransom’s 
candor and his indubitable right to considera- 
tion, he allowed himself to admit that he had 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


63 


seen Mrs. Ransom during the last three days 
and that he had every reason to believe that 
there was a twin sister in the case and that all 
Mrs. Ransomfe eccentric conduct was attribu- 
table to this fact and the overpowering sense 
of responsibility which it seemed to have brought 
to her — a result which would not appear 
strange to those who knew the sensitiveness 
of her nature and the delicate balance of her 
mind. 

Mr. Ransom recalled the tenor of her strange 
letter on this subject, but was not convinced. 
He inquired of Mr. Harper if he had heard her 
say anything about the equally astounding 
fact of a returned brother, and when he found 
that this was mere jargon to Mr. Harper, he 
related what he knew of Hazen and left the 
lawyer to draw his own inferences. 

The result was some show of embarrassment 
on the part of Mr. Harper. It was evident that 
in her consultations with him she had entirely 
left out all allusion to this brother. Either the 
man had advanced a false claim or else she was 
in an irresponsible condition of mind which made 
her see a sister where there was a brother. 

Ransom made some remark indicative of 
his appreciation of the dilemma in which they 


64 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


found themselves, but was quickly silenced by 
the other^s emphatic assertion: 

have seen the girl; she was with Mrs. 
Ransom the day she came here. She sat in 
the adjoining room while we talked over her 
case in this one.” 

^^You saw her — saw her face?” 

No, not her face; she was too heavily veiled 
for that. Mrs. Ransom explained why. They 
were too absurdly alike, she said. It awoke 
comment and it gave her the creeps. But their 
figures were identical though their dresses 
were different.” 

^‘So! there is some one then; the girl is not 
absolutely a myth.” 

Far from it. Nor is the will which Mrs. 
Ransom has asked me to draw up for her a 
myth.” 

Her will! she has asked you to draw up her 
will!” 

'^Yes. That was the object of her visit. 
She had entered the married state, she said, 
and wished to make a legal disposition of her 
property before she returned to you. She was 
very nervous when she said this; very nervous 
through all the interview. There was nothing 
else for me to do but comply.” 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


65 


"And you have drawn up this will?^^ 
"According to her instructions, yes/^ 

"But she has not signed it?^' 

"Not yet.’^ 

"But she intends to?’^ 

" Certainly.’’ 

"Then you will see her again?” 

" Naturally.” 

"/s the time set?” 

The lawyer rose to his feet. He understood 
the hint implied and for an instant appeared 
to waver. There was something very winsome 
about Roger Ransom; some attribute or ex- 
pression which appealed especially to men. 

" I wish I might help you out of your dif- 
ficulty,” said he. "But a client’s wishes are 
paramount. Mrs. Ransom desired secrecy. She 
had every right to demand it of me.” 

Mr. Ransom’s face fell. Hope had fiashed 
upon him only to disappear again. The lawyer 
eyed him out of the corner of his eye, his mouth 
working slightly as he walked to and fro between 
his desk and the door. 

"Mrs. Ransom will not always feel herself 
hampered by a sister, or, if you prefer it, a 
brother who has so inconveniently come back 
from the dead. You will have the pleasure 


66 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


of her society some day. There is no doubt 
about her affection for you.” 

“ But that isnT it,” exclaimed the now 
thoroughly discouraged husband. I am afraid 
for her reason, afraid for her life. There is 
something decidedly wrong somewhere. DonT 
you see that I must have an immediate inter- 
view with her if only to satisfy myself that she 
aggravates her own danger? Why should she 
make a will in this underhanded way? Does 
she fear opposition from me? I have a fortune 
equal to her own. It is something else she 
dreads. What? I feel that I ought to know 
if only to protect her against herself. I would 
even promise not to show myself or to speak.” 

“ I am sorry to have to say good afternoon, 
Mr. Ransom. Have you any commands that 
I can execute for you?” 

^‘None but to give her my love. Tell her 
there is not a more unhappy man in New York; 
you may add that I trust her affection.” 

The lawyer bowed. Mr. Ransom and Ger- 
ridge withdrew. At the foot of the stairs they 
were stopped by the shout of a small boy 
behind them. 

'^Say, mister, did you drop something?” he 
called down, coming meanwhile as rapidly 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


67 


after them as the steepness of the flight allowed. 
“Mr. Harper says, he found this where you 
gentlemen were sitting.’^ 

Mr. Ransom, somewhat startled, took the 
small paper offered him. It was none of his 
property but he held to it just the same. In 
the middle of a torn bit of paper he had read 
these words written in his own wife’s hand: 

Hunter’s Tavern, 

Sitford, Connecticut. 

At 9 o’clock April the 15th. 

“By Jove!” he exclaimed, “no one will ever 
hear me say again that lawyers are devoid of 
heart?” 


CHAPTER VII 


RAIN 

Mr. Ransom had never heard of Sitford, but 
upon inquiry learned that it was a small manu- 
facturing town some ten miles from the direct 
route of travel, to which it was only connected 
by a stage-coach running once a day, late in the 
afternoon. 

What a spot for a meeting of this kind! 
Why chosen by her? Why submitted to by 
this busy New York lawyer? Was this another 
mystery; or had he misinterpreted Mr. Harper^s 
purpose in passing over to him the address of 
this small town? He preferred to think the 
former. He could hardly contemplate now 
the prospect of failing to see her again which 
must follow any mistake as to this being the 
place agreed upon for the signing of her 
will. 

Meantime he had said nothing to Gerridge. 
This was a hope too personal to confide in a 
man of his position. He would go to Sitford 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


69 


and endeavor to catch a glimpse of his wife 
there. If successful, the whole temper of his 
mind might change towards the situation, if 
not toward her. He would at least have the 
satisfaction of seeing her. The detective had 
enough to do in New York. 

April the fifteenth fell on Tuesday. He was 
not minded to wait so long but took the boat 
on Monday afternoon. This landed him some 
time before daylight at the time-worn village 
from which the coach ran to Sitford. A rail- 
way connected this village with New York, 
necessitating no worse inconvenience than cross- 
ing the river on a squat, old-fashioned ferry 
boat; but he calculated that both the lawyer 
and Mrs. Ransom would make use of this, and 
felt the risk would be less for him if he chose 
the slower and less convenient route. 

He Jiad given his name on the boat as Roger 
Johnston, which was true so far as it went, and 
he signed this same name at the hotel where he 
put up till morning. The place was an entirely 
unknown one to him and he was unknown to 
it. Both fortuitous facts, he thought, in the 
light of his own perplexity as to the position 
in which he really stood towards this mysteri- 
ous wife of his. 


70 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


The coach, as I have said, ran late in the 
afternoon. This was to accommodate the pas- 
sengers who came by rail. But Mr. Ransom 
had not planned to go by coach. That would 
be to risk a premature encounter with his wife, 
or at least with the lawyer. He preferred to 
hire a team, and be driven there by some in- 
different livery-stable man. Neither prospect 
was pleasing. It had been raining all night, 
and bade fair to rain all day. The river was 
clouded with mist; the hills, which are the 
glory of the place, were obliterated from the 
landscape, and the road — he had never seen 
such a road, all little pools and mud. 

However, there was no help for it. The 
journey must be made, and seeing a livery- 
stable sign across the road, lost no time in 
securing the conveyance he needed. At nine 
o’clock he started out. 

The rain drove so fiercely from the north- 
west, — the very direction in which they were 
traveling, — that enjoyment of the scenery 
was impossible. Nor could any pleasure be 
got out of conversation with the man who 
drove him. Rain, rain, that was all; and the 
splash of mud over the wheels which turned 
all too slowly for his comfort. And there were 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


71 


to be ten miles of this. Naturally he turned 
to his thoughts and they were all of her. 

Why had he not known her better before 
linking his fate to hers? Why had he never 
encouraged her to talk to him more about her- 
self and her early life? Had he but done so, 
he might now have some clew to the mystery 
devouring him. He might know why so rich 
and independent a woman had chosen this 
remote town on an inaccessible road, for the 
completion of an act which was in itself a mys- 
tery. Why could not the will have been 
signed in New York? But he was not inquisi- 
tive in those days. He had taken her for what 
she seemed — an untrammeled, gay-hearted 
girl, ready to love and be his happy wife and 
lifelong companion; and he had been con- 
tented to keep all conversation along natural 
lines and do no probing. And now, — this 
brother whom all had thought dead, come to 
life with menace in his acts and conversation! 
Also a sister, — but this sister he had no belief 
in. The coincidence was too startlingly out 
of nature for him to accept a brother and a 
sister too. A brother or a sister; but not both. 
Not even Mr. Harper^s assurances should in- 
fluence his credulity to this extent. Money! 


72 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


money is at the bottom of it all” was his final 
decision. “She knows it and is making her 
will, as a possible protection. But why come 
here?^’ 

Thus every reflection ended. 

Suddenly a vanished, half-forgotten memory 
came back. It brought a gleam of light into 
the darkness which had hitherto enveloped the 
whole matter. She had once spoken to him 
of her early life. She had . mentioned a place 
where she used to play as a child; had men- 
tioned it lovingly, longingly. There were hills, 
she had said; hills all around. And woods full 
of chestnut-trees, safe woods where she could 
wander at will. And the roads — how she 
loved to walk the roads. No automobiles then, 
not even bicycles. One could go miles without 
meeting man or horse. Sometimes a heavily- 
laden cart would go by drawn by a long string 
of oxen; but they were picturesque and added 
to the charm. Oxen were necessary where 
there was no railroad. 

As he repeated these words to himself, he 
looked up. Through the downpour his eyes 
could catch a glimpse of the road before him, 
winding up a long hillside. Down this , road 
was approaching a dozen yoke of oxen drag- 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


73 


ging a wagon piled with bales of some sort of 
merchandise. One question in his mind was 
answered. This spot was not an unknown 
one to her. It was connected with her child- 
hood days. There was reason back of her 
choice of it as a place of meeting between her 
and her lawyer, or if not reason, association, 
and that of the tenderest kind. He felt him- 
self relieved of the extreme weight of his op- 
pression and ventured upon asking a question 
or two about Sitford, which he took pains to 
say he was visiting for the first time. 

The information he obtained was but meager, 
but he did learn that there was a very fair 
tavern there and that the manufactures of the 
place were sufficient to account for a stranger^s 
visit. The articles made were mostly novelties. 

This knowledge he meant to turn to account, 
but changed his mind when they finally splashed 
into town and stopped before the tavern 
which had been so highly recommended by his 
driver. The house, dripping though it was 
from every eave, had such a romantic air that 
he thought he could venture to cite other 
reasons for his stay there than the prosaic one 
of business. That is, if the landlady should 
give any evidence of being at all in accord with 


74 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


her quaint home and picturesque surround- 
ings. 

She showed herself and he at once gave her 
credit for being all he could wish in the way 
of credulity and good-nature, and meeting her 
with the smile which had done good execution 
in its day, he asked if she had a room for a 
writer who was finishing a book, and who only 
asked for quiet and regular meals before his 
own cosy fire This to rouse her imagination 
and make her amenable to his wishes for 
secrecy. 

She was a simple soul and fell easily into the 
trap. In half an hour Mr. Ransom was en- 
sconced in a pleasant room over the porch, a 
room which he soon learned possessed many 
advantages. For it not only overlooked the 
main entrance, but was so placed as to com- 
mand a view of all the rooms on his hall. In 
two of those rooms he bade fair to be greatly 
interested, Mrs. Deo having remarked that 
they were being prepared for a lady who was 
coming that night. As he had no doubt who 
this lady was, he encouraged the good woman 
to talk, and presently had the satisfaction of 
hearing her say that she was very happy over 
this lady's coming, as she was a Sitford girl. 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


75 


one of the old family of Hazens, and though 
married now and very rich was much loved 
by every one in town because she had never 
forgotten Sitford or Sitford people. 

She was coming! He had made no mistake. 
And this was the place of her birth, just as he 
had decided when he saw that long line of 
oxen! He realized how fortunate he was, or 
rather how indebted he was to Mr. Harper, 
since in this place only could he hope to gain 
satisfaction on the mooted point raised by 
that same gentleman. If she had been born 
here, so had her twin sister; so had the brother 
whose claims lay counter to that sister’s. 
Both must have been known to these people, 
their persons, their history and the circum- 
stances of their supposed deaths. The clews 
thus afforded must prove invaluable to him. 
From them he must soon be able to ascertain 
in which story to place faith and which claimant 
to believe. He might have interrogated his 
hostess, but feared to show his interest in the 
supposed stranger. He preferred to wait a 
few hours and gather his facts from other lips. 

Meantime it rained. 


CHAPTER VIII 


ELIMINATION 

At about three o’clock in the afternoon Mr. 
Ransom left his room. He had been careful 
almost from his first arrival to sit with his 
door ajar. He had, therefore, only to give it 
a slight push and walk out when he heard the 
bustle of preparation going on in the two rooms 
in whose future occupancy he was so vitally 
interested. A maid stood in the hall. A man 
within was pushing about furniture. The land- 
lady was giving orders. His course down- 
stairs did not lead him so far as those rooms, 
so he called out pleasantly : 

“ I have written till my head aches, Mrs. Deo. 
I must venture out notwithstanding the rain. 
In which direction shall I find the best walk- 
ing?” 

She came to him all eagerness and smiles. 
“ It’s all bad, such a day,” said she, but it’s 
muddiest down by the factories. You had 
better climb the hill.” 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


77 


“Where the cemetery is?” he asked. 

“Yes; do you object to cemeteries? Ours 
is thought to be very interesting. We have 
stones there whose inscriptions are a hundred 
and fifty years old. But it^s a bad day to 
walk amongst graves. Perhaps you had better 
go east. I^m sorry we should have such a 
storm on your first day. Must you go out?” 

He forced a suffering look into his eyes, and 
insisting that nothing but out-door air would 
help him when he had a headache, hastened 
down-stairs and so out. A blinding gust seized 
him as he faced the hill, but he drew down his 
umbrella and hurried on. He had a purpose 
in following her suggestion as to a walk in this 
direction. Dark as the grasses were, he meant 
to search the cemetery for the graves of the 
Hazens and see what' he could learn from 
them. 

He met three persons on his way, all of whom 
turned to look at him. This was in the village. 
On the hillside he met nobody. Wind and rain 
and mud were all; desolation in the prospect 
and all but desolation in his heart. At the 
brow he first caught sight of the broken stone 
wall which separated the old burying place 
from the road. There lay his path. Happily 


78 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


he could tread it unnoticed and unwatched. 
There was no one within sight, high or low. 

He spent a half hour among the tombs be- 
fore he struck the name he was looking for. 
Another ten minutes before he found those 
of his wife’s family. Then he had his reward. 
On a low brown shaft he read the names of 
father and mother, and beneath them the fol- 
lowing lines : 

Sacred to the memory of 
Anitra 

Died June 7, 1885 
Aged 6 years and one day. 

0/ such is the Kingdom of heaven. 

The twin! Georgian was mad. This record 
showed that her little sister lay there. Anitra, 
— yes, that was the name of her other half. 
He remembered it well. Georgian had men- 
tioned it to him more than once. And this 
child, this Anitra, had been buried here for 
fifteen years. 

Deeply indignant at his wife’s duplicity, he 
took a look at the opposite side of the shaft 
where still another surprise awaited him. Here 
was the record of the brother; the brother he 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


79 


had so lately talked to and who had seemingly 
proven his claim to the name he now read: 

Alfred Francecso 
only son of 

Georgian Toritti afterwards Georgian Hazen. 

Lost at sea February, 1895 
Aged twenty-five years. 

An odd inscription opening up conjectures 
of the most curious and interesting nature. 
But it was not this fact which struck him at 
the time, it was the possibility underlying the 
simple statement. Lost at sea. This, as the 
wry-necked man had said, admitted of a pos- 
sible resurrection. Here was no body. A 
mound showed where Anitra had been laid 
away; a little mound surmounted by a head- 
stone carved with her name. But only these 
few words gave evidence of the young man^s 
death, and inscriptions of this nature are some- 
times false. 

The conclusion was obvious. It was the 
brother and not the sister who had reappeared. 
Georgian was not only playing him false but 
deceiving the general public. In fact, know- 
ingly or unknowingly, she was perpetrating a 
great fraud. He was inclined to think unknow- 


80 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


ingly. Be began to regard with less incredulity 
Hazen^s declaration that the shock of her 
brother's return had unsettled her mind. 

Distressed, but no longer the prey of distract- 
ing doubt, he again examined the inscription 
before him and this time noticed its peculiari- 
ties. Alfred FrancescOj only son of Georgian 
Toritti afterwards Georgian Hazen. Afterwards! 
What was meant by that afterwards? That the 
woman had been married twice, and that this 
Alfred Francesco was the son of her first hus- 
band rather than of the one whose name he 
bore? It looked that way. There was a sug- 
gestion of Italian parentage in the Francesco 
which corresponded well with the decidedly 
Italian Toritti. 

Perplexed and not altogether satisfied with 
his discoveries, he turned to leave the place 
when he found himself in the presence of a 
man carrying a kit of tools and wearing on his 
face a harsh and discontented expression. As 
this man v/as middle-aged and had no other 
protection from the rain than a rubber cape for 
his shoulders, the cause of his discontent was 
easy enough to imagine; though why he should 
come into this place with tools was more than 
Mr. Ransom could understand. 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


81 


Hello, stranger/^ It was this man who 
spoke. Interested in the Hazen monument, 
eh? Well, ril soon give you reason to be 
more interested yet. Do you see this inscrip- 
tion — On June 7, 1885; Anitra, aged six, and 
the rest of it? Well, I cut them letters there 
fifteen years ago. Now I’m to cut ’em out. 
The orders has just come. The youngster 
didn’t die it seems, and I’m commanded to 
chip the fifteen-year-old lie out. What do you 
think of that? A sweet job for a day like this. 
Mor’n likely it’ll put me under a stone myself. 
But folks won’t listen to reason. It’s been 
here fifteen years and seventeen days and now 
it must come out, rain or shine, before night- 
fall. ^Before the sun sets,’ so the telegram 
ran. I’ll be blessed but I’U ask a handsome 
penny for this job.” 

Mr. Ransom, controlling himself with diffi- 
culty, pointed to the little mound. ^^But the 
child seems to have been buried here,” he said. 

“ Lord bless you, yes, a child was buried 
here, but we all knew years ago that it mightn’t 
be Hazen’s. The schoolhouse burned and a 
dozen children with it. One of the little bodies 
was given to Mr. Hazen for burial. He believed 
it was his Anitra, but a good while after, a bit 


82 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


of the dress she wore that day was found hang- 
ing to a bush where some gipsies had been. 
There were lots of folks who remembered that 
them gipsies had passed the schoolhouse a 
half hour before the fire, and they now say 
found the little girl hiding behind the wood- 
pile, and carried her off. No one ever knew; 
but her death was always thought doubtful by 
every one but Mr. and Mrs. Hazen. They 
stuck to the old idee and believed her to be 
buried under this mound where her name is.^^ 
^^But one of the children was buried here,^’ 
persisted Ransom. You must have known 
the number of those lost and would surely be 
able to tell if one were missing, as must have 
been the case if the gipsies had carried off 
Anitra before the fire.^’ 

I donT know about that,’’ objected the 
stone-cutter. “ There was, in those days, a 
little orphan girl, almost an idiot, who wandered 
about this town, staying now in one house and 
now in another as folks took compassion on 
her. She was never seen agin after that fire. 
If she was in the schoolhouse that day, as she 
sometimes was, the number would be made up. 
No one was left to tell us. It was an awful 
time, sir. The village hasn’t got over it yet.” 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


83 


Mr. Ransom made some sympathetic re- 
joinder and withdrew towards the gateway, 
but soon came strolling back. The man had 
arranged his tools and was preparing to go to 
work. 

It seems as if the family was pretty well 
represented here,’’ remarked Ransom. ^^Is it 
the girl herself, — Anitra, I believe you called 
her, — who has ordered this record of her 
death removed?” 

Oh, no, you don’t know them Hazens. 
There’s one of ’em who has quite a story; the 
twin of this Anitra. She lived to grow up and 
have a lot of money left her. If you lived in 
Sitford, or lived in New York, you’d know all 
about her; for her name’s been in the papers 
a lot this week. She’s the great lady who 
married and left her husband all in one day; 
and for what reason do you think? We know, 
because she don’t keep no secrets from her old 
friends. She^s found this sister, and it’s her as 
has ordered me to chip away this name. She 
wants it done to-day, because she’s coming 
here with this gal she’s found. Folks say she 
ran across her in the street and knew her at 
once. Can you guess how?” 

From her name?” 


84 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


“ Lord, no; from what I hear, she hadn’t any 
name. From her looks! She saw her own self 
when she looked at her. 

“ How interesting, how very interesting,” 
stammered Mr. Ransom, feeling his newly won 
convictions shaken again. “Quite remarkable 
the whole story. And so is this inscription,” he 
added, pointing to the words Georgian Torittij 
etc. ^^Did the woman have two husbands, 
and was the Alfred Hazen, whose death at sea 
is commemorated here, the son of Toritti or of 
Hazen?” 

^^Of Toritti,” grumbled the man, evidently 
displeased at the question. ^^A black-browed 
devil who it won’t do to talk about here. Mrs. 
Hazen was only a slip of a gal when she 
married him, and as he didn’t live but a couple 
o’ months folks have sort o’ forgiven her and 
forgotten him. To us Mrs. Hazen was always 
Mrs. Hazen; and Alf — well, he was just Alf 
Hazen too; a lad with too much good in him 
to perish in them murderous waters a thou- 
sand miles from home.” 

So they still believed Hazen dead! No in- 
timation of his return had as yet reached 
Sitford. This was what Ransom wanted to 
know. But there was still much to learn. 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


85 


Should he venture an additional question? No, 
that would show more than a stranger’s inter- 
est in a topic so purely local. Better leave 
well enough alone and quit the spot before he 
committed himself. 

Uttering some commonplace observation 
about the fatality attending certain families, 
he nodded a friendly good-by and made for 
the entrance. 

As he stepped below the brow of the hill he 
heard the first click of the workman’s hammer 
on the chisel with which he proposed to elimi- 
nate the word Anitra from the list of the Hazen 
dead. 


CHAPTER IX 
hunter’s inn 

When Mr. Ransom re-entered the hotel, 
which he did under a swoop of wind which 
turned his umbrella inside out and drenched 
him through in an instant, it was to find the 
house in renewed turmoil, happily explained 
by the landlady, whom he ran across on the 
stairs. 

^‘Oh, Mr. Johnston!” she cried as she edged 
by him with a pile of bed-linen on her arm. 

Please excuse all this fuss. Another guest is 
coming — I have just got a telegram. A 
famous lawyer from New York. Our house 
will be full to-night.” 

Where will you put him?” inquired Mr. 
Ransom with a good-natured air. “ There seem 
to be no unoccupied rooms on this hall.” 

“More’s the pity,” she sighed, with a half- 
inquiring, half deprecatory look at this for- 
tunate first comer. “ I shall have to put him 
below, poor man. I’m afraid he won’t like it, 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


87 


but — Mr. Ransom remained silent. But/’ 
she went on with sudden cheerfulness, I will 
make it up in the supper. That shall be as 
good a one as our kitchen will provide. Four 
city guests all in one day! That’s a good many 
for this quiet hotel.” 

^^Four!” retorted Mr. Ransom as he turned 
towards his own door. The number has 
grown by two since I went out.” 

“ Oh, I didn’t tell you. The lady — her 
name’s Mrs. Ransom — brings her sister with 
her. The little girl who — yes, I am coming.” 
This latter to some perplexed domestic down 
the hall, who had already called her twice. 

I mustn’t stand talking here,” she apologized 
as she hurried away. ^^But do take care of 
yourself. You are dreadful wet. How I wish 
the weather would clear up!” 

Mr. Ransom wished the same. To say 
nothing of his own inconvenience, it was a 
source of anxiety to him that she should have 
to ride these inevitable ten miles in such a 
chilling downpour. Besides, a storm of this 
kind complicated matters; gave him less sense 
of freedom, shut him in, as it were, with the 
mystery he was there to unravel, but which 
for some reason, hardly explainable to himself, 


88 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


filled him with such a sense of foreboding that 
he had moments in which he thought only of 
escape. But his part must be played and he 
prepared himself to play it well. Having 
changed his clothes and warmed himself with 
a draft of whisky, he sat down at his table 
and was busy writing when the maid came in 
to ask if he would wait for his supper till the 
coach came, or have it earlier and served in his 
owH room. 

With an air of petulance, he looked up, 
rapped on the table, and replied: 

“ Here! here! I’m too busy to meet strangers. 
An early supper and an early bed. That’s the 
way I get through my work.” 

The girl stared and went softly out. Work! 
— that? Sitting at a table and just putting 
words on paper. If it was beds he had to drag 
around now, or a dozen hungry, clamoring 
men to feed all at once, and all with the best 
cuts, or stairs to run up fifty times a day, or — 
but I need not fill out her thought. It made her 
voluble in the kitchen and secured him the 
privacy which his incognito demanded. 

His supper over, he waited feverishly for 
the coach, which ordinarily was due at seven 
in the evening. To-night it bade fair to be 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


89 


late, owing to the bad condition of the roads 
and the early darkness. The wind had gone 
down, but it still rained. Not quite so tem- 
pestuously as when he roamed the cemetery, 
but steadily enough to keep eaves and branches 
dripping. The sound of this ceaseless drip 
was eerie enough to his strained senses, waiting 
as he was for an event which might determine 
the happiness or the misery of his life. He 
tried to forget it and wrote diligently, putting 
down words whose meaning he did not stop to 
consider, so that he had something to show to 
prying eyes if such should ever glance through 
his papers. But the sound had got on his 
brain, and presently became so insistent that 
he rose again and flung his window up to see 
if he were deceived in thinking he heard a 
deep roar mingling with the incessant patter, 
a roar which the wind had hitherto prevented 
him from separating from the general turmoil, 
but which now was apparent enough to call 
for some explanation. 

He had made no mistake; a steady sound of 
rushing water filled the outside air. A fall 
was near, a fall by means of which, no doubt, 
the factories were run. 

Why had he not thought of this? Why had 


90 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


its sound held a note of menpxe for him, awaken- 
ing feelings he did not understand and from 
which he sought to escape? A factory fall 
swollen by the rain! What was there in this 
to make his hand shake and cause the deepen- 
ing night to seem positively hateful to him? 
With a bang he closed the window; then he 
softly threw it up again. Surely he had heard 
the noise of wheels splashing through the pools 
of the highway. The coach was coming! and 
with it — what? 

His room was in the gable end facing the 
road. From it he could look directly down on 
the porch of entrance, a fact which he had 
thankfully noted at his first look. As he 
heard the bustle which now broke out below, 
and caught the gleam of a lantern coming 
round the corner of the house, he softly stepped 
to his lamp and put it out, then took his stand 
at the window. The coach was now very near; 
he could hear the straining of the harness and 
the shouts of the driver. In another moment 
it drew lumberingly up. A man from the 
hotel advanced with an umbrella; a young 
lady was helped out who, standing one moment 
in the full glare of the lights thrown upon her 
from the open door, showed him the face and 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


91 


form he knew so well and loved — yes, loved 
for all her mystery, as he knew by the wild 
beating of his heart, and the irresistible im- 
pulse he felt to rush down and receive her in his 
arms, to her great terror doubtless, but to his 
own boundless satisfaction and delight. But 
strong as the temptation was, he did not yield 
to it. Something in her attitude, as she stood 
there, talking earnestly to the driver, held him 
spellbound and alert. All was not right; there 
was passion in her movements and in her 
voice. What she said drew the heads of land- 
lady and maid from the open door and caused 
the man with the lantern to peer past her into 
the coach and backward along the road. What 
lad happened? Nothing that concerned the 
1 iwyer. Mr. Ransom could see him disentang- 
ling himself from the coverings in front where 
he had ridden with the driver, but the sister 
was not there. No .other lady got out of the 
coach even after his young wife had finished 
her conversation with the driver and dis- 
appeared into the house. 

^^How can I stand this?” thought Mr. Ran- 
som as the coach finally rattled and swished 
away towards the stable. “ I must hear, I must 
see, I must know what is going on down there.” 


92 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


This because he heard voices in the open 
hall. Crossing to his own doorway, he listened. 
His wife and Mr. Harper had stepped into the 
office close by the front door. He could hear 
now and then a word of what they said, but 
not all. Venturing a step further, he leaned 
over the • balustrade which extended almost 
up to his own door. This was better; he 
could now catch most of the words and some- 
times a sentence. They all referred to the 
sister. “ Temper — her own way — deaf — 
would walk in all the rain and slush. — A 
strange character — you canT imagine,’^ and 
other similar phrases, uttered in a passionate 
and half-angry voice. Then ejaculations from 
Mrs. Deo, and a word or two of caution or 
injunction in the polished tones of the lawyer, 
followed by a sudden rush towards the stair- 
case, over which he was leaning. 

“ Show me my room,’^ rang up in Georgian's 
bell-like tones; ^Hhen 1^11 tell you what to do 
about her. She isn^t easily managed.’^ 

^^But she’ll get her death!” expostulated 
Mrs. Deo; “ to say nothing of her losing her way 
in this dreadful darkness. Let me send — 
^‘Not yet,” broke in his young wife’s voice, 
with just the hint of asperity in it. '‘She 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


93 


must trudge out her tantrum first. I think 
her idea was to show that she remembered the 
old place and the lane where she used to pick 
blackberries. You needn’t worry about her 
getting cold. She’s lived a gipsy life too 
many years to mind wind and wet. But it’s 
different with me. I’m all in a shiver. Which 
is my room, please?” 

She was now at the head of the stairs. Mr. 
Ransom had closed his door, but not latched 
it, and as she turned to go down the hall, fol- 
lowed by the chattering landlady, he swung 
it open for an instant and so caught one full 
glimpse of her beloved figure. She was dressed 
in a long rain-coat and had some sort of modish 
hat on her head, which, in spite of its simplicity, 
gave her a highly fashionable air. A woman 
to draw all eyes, but such a mystery to her 
husband! Such a mystery to all who knew 
her story, or rather her actions, for no one 
seemed to know her story. 

Events did not halt. He heard her give this 
and that order, open a door and look in; say a 
word of commendation, ask if the key was on 
her side of the partition, then shut the door 
again and open another. 

“Ah, this looks comfortable,” she exclaimed 


94 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


in great satisfaction. “ Is that my bag? Put 
it down, please. Pll open it. Now, if you^ll 
leave me a moment alone. I’ll soon be ready. 
But you mustn’t expect me to eat till Anitra 
comes. I couldn’t do that. Oh, she’s a dread- 
ful trial, Mrs. Deo; you have a motherly face, 
and I can tell you that the girl is just eating 
up my life. If she weren’t my very self, 
deafened by hard usage, and rendered coarse 
and wilful by years of a miserable and half- 
starved life, I couldn’t bear it, especially after 
what I’ve sacrificed for her. I’ve parted with 
my husband — but I can’t talk, I can’t. I 
would not have said so much if you hadn’t 
looked so kind.” 

All this her husband heard, followed by a sob 
or two, quickly checked however, by a high 
strained laugh and the gay remark: 

“I’m wet enough, but she’ll be dripping. 
I’m afraid she’ll have to have her supper in 
her room. She got out at the new school- 
house and started to come through the lane. 
It must be a weltering pool. If I’m dressed 
in time I’ll come down and meet her at the 
door. Meanwhile don’t wait for us; give Mr. 
Harper his supper.” 

Her door closed, then suddenly opened again. 


A WOMAN OF MYSTERY 


95 


“ If she don^t come in ten minutes, let some one 
go to the head of the lane. But be sure it^s a 
careful person who won^t startle her. Fve got 
to put on another dress, so don^t bother me. 
Vll hear her when she enters her own room and 
will speak to her then — if I dare; Fm not sure 
that I shall.’’ And the door shut to again, this 
time with a snap of the lock. Quiet reigned 
once more in the hall save for Mrs. Deo’s mut- 
tered exclamations as she made her laborious 
way down-stairs. Had this good woman been 
less disturbed and not in so much of a hurry, 
she might have noted that the door of her 
literary guest’s room was ajar, and stopped to 
ask why the lamp remained unlit. 

For five minutes, for ten minutes, he watched 
and listened, passing continually to and fro 
from door to window. But his vigilance re- 
mained unrewarded by any further movement 
in the hall, or by the sight of an approaching 
figure up the road. He began to feel odd, and 
was asking himself what sort of fool-work this 
was, when a clatter of voices rose below, fol- 
lowed by heavy steps on the veranda. One 
or two men were going out, and as it seemed 
to him the landlady too, for he heard her say 
just as the door closed: 


96 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


Let me on ahead; she must see a woman^s 
kind face first, poor child, or we shall not suc- 
ceed in getting her in. I know all about these 
wild ones.^’ 


PART II 

The Call of the Waterfall 
CHAPTER X 

TWO DOORS 

The enthusiasm, the expectation in Mrs. 
Dec's voice were unmistakable. This good 
woman believed in this rescued waif of turbu- 
lent caprices and gipsy ways, and from this 
moment he began to believe in her too, and 
consequently to share some of the excitement 
which had now become prevalent all through 
the house. 

His suspense was destined to be short. 
While he was straining his eyes to see what 
might be going on down the road, a small 
crowd of people came round the corner of the 
house. In their midst walked a woman with 
a shawl or cape over her head — a fierce and 
wilful figure which shook off the hand kind Mrs. 
Deo laid on her arm, and shrank as the great 
front door fell open, sending forth a flood of 
light which, to one less wedded to wild ways and 
outdoor living, promised a hospitable cheer. 


98 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


Georgian's form!^^ muttered Ransom in- 
voluntarily to himself. “ And Georgian’s face ! ” 
he felt obliged to add, as the light fell broadly 
across her. “But not Georgian’s ways and 
not Georgian’s nature,” he impetuously finished 
as she slipped out of sight. 

Then the mystery of the brother came rushing 
over him and he yielded himself again to the 
wonder of the situation till he was reawakened 
to realities by the shuffling of feet on the stair- 
way and the raised tones of Mrs. Deo as she 
tried to make herself understood by her new 
and somewhat difficult guest. A maid followed 
in their wake, and from some as yet unexplored 
region below there rose the sound of clattering 
dishes. 

It was a trying moment for him. He longed 
for another glimpse of the girl, but feared to 
betray his own curiosity to the two women who 
accompanied her. Should he be forced to 
allow her to enter her room unseen? Might 
he not better run some small risk of detection? 
He had escaped discovery before; wasn’t it 
possible for him to escape it again? He finally 
compromised matters by first flinging his door 
wide open and then retreating to the other 
end of the room where the shadows appeared 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


99 


heavy enough to hide him. From this point 
he cast a look down the hall which was in a 
direct line from his present standpoint, and was 
fortunate enough to catch a glimpse of the 
girl with her face turned in his direction. Her 
companions, on the contrary, were standing 
with their backs to him, one beside the door she 
had just thrown open, the other at his wife^s 
door on which she had just given a significant 
rap. 

Such was the picture. 

The girl absorbed all his attention. The 
shawl — a gay one with colors in it — had 
fallen from her head and was trailing, wet and 
bedraggled, over an equally bedraggled skirt. 
Soused with wet, her hair disheveled, and all 
her garments awry with the passion of her 
movements, she yet made his heart stand still, 
as, with a sullen look at those about her, she 
rushed into the room prepared for her use and 
slammed the door behind her with a quick cry 
of mingled rage and relief. For with all these 
drawbacks of manner and appearance she was 
the living picture of Georgian; so like her, 
indeed, that he could well understand now 
the shock which his darling received when, in 
the unconsciousness of possessing a living 


100 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


sister, she had encountered in street or store, 
or wherever they had first met, this living re- 
production of herself. 

^^No wonder she became confused as to her 
duty,’’ he muttered. I even feel myself be- 
coming confused as to mine.” 

“Bring me up something to eat,” he now 
heard this latest comer shout from her door- 
way. “ I don’t want tea and I don’t want 
soup; I want meat, meat. And I shan’t go 
down afterward, either. I’m going to stay 
right here. I’ve seen enough of people I don’t 
know. And of my sister too. She was cross 
to me because I hated the coach and wanted to 
walk, and she shan’t come into my room till 
I tell her to. Don’t forget; it’s meat I want, 
just meat and something sweet. Pudding’s 
good.” 

All shocking to Mr. Ransom’s taste, but more 
so to his heart. For notwithstanding the 
coarseness of the expressions, the voice was 
Georgian’s and laden with a hundred memories. 

He was still struggling with the agitation 
of this discovery when he heard Mrs. Deo give 
another tap on his wife’s door. This time it 
was unlocked and pushed softly open, and 
through the crack thus made some whispered 


THE CALL OP THE WATERFALL 101 

orders were given. These seemed to satisfy 
Mrs. Deo, for she called the maid to her and 
together they hurried down the hall to a rear 
staircase, communicating with the kitchen. 
This was fortunate for him, for if they had 
turned his way he would have had to issue 
from his room and take open part in the excite- 
ment of the moment. 

A few minutes of quiet now supervened. 
During these he decided that if he must keep 
up this watch — and nothing now could deter 
him from doing so — he must take a posi- 
tion consistent with his assumed character. 
Detection by Georgian was what he now feared. 
Whatever happened, she must not get the 
smallest glimpse of him or be led by any in- 
discretion on his part to suspect his presence 
under the same roof as herself. Yet he must 
see all, hear all that was possible to him. For 
this a continuance of the present conditions, 
an open door and no light, were positively 
requisite. But how avert the comment which 
this unusual state of things must awaken if 
noticed? But one expedient suggested itself. 
He would light a cigar and sit in the window. 
If questioned he would say that he was en- 
gaged in deciding how he would end the story 


102 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


he was writing; that such contemplation 
called for darkness but above all for good air; 
that had the weather been favorable he would 
have obtained the latter by opening the win- 
dow; but it being so bad he could only open 
the door. Certain eccentricities are allowable 
in authors. 

This settled, he proceeded to take a chair 
and envelope himself in smoke. With eyes 
fixed on the dimly-lighted vista of the hall 
before him, he waited. What would happen 
next? Would his wife reappear? No; supper 
was coming up. He could hear dishes rattling 
on the rear stairway, and in another moment 
saw the maid coming down the hall with a 
large tray in her hands. She stopped at 
Anitra^s door, knocked, and was answered by 
the harsh command : 

Set it down. Ifil get it for myself.’’ 

The maid set it down. 

Next instant Mrs. Ransom’s door opened. 

“Don’t be too generous with me,” he heard 
her call softly out. “ I can’t eat. I’m too 
upset for much food. Tea,” she whispered, 
“and some nice toast. Tell Mrs. Deo that I 
want nothing else. She will understand.” 

The maid nodded and disappeared down the 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


103 


hall just as a bare arm was thrust out from 
Anitra^s door and the tray drawn in. A few 
minutes later the other tray came up and was 
carried into Mrs. Ransom’s room. The con- 
trast in the way the two trays had been re- 
ceived struck him as showing the difference 
between the two women, especially after he 
had been given an opportunity, as he was later, 
of seeing the ferocious way in which the food 
brought to Anitra had been disposed of. 

But I anticipate. The latter tray had not 
yet been pushed again into the hall, and Mr. 
Ransom was still smoking his first cigar when 
he heard the lawyer’s voice in the office below 
asking to have pen and ink placed in the small 
reception-room. This recalled him to the real 
purpose of his wife’s presence in the house, and 
also assured him that the opportunity would 
soon be given him for another glimpse of her 
before the evening was over. It was also likely 
to be a full-face one, as she would have to 
advance several steps directly towards him 
before taking the turn leading to the front 
staircase. 

He awaited the moment eagerly. The hour 
for signing the will had been set at nine 
o’clock, but it was surely long past that time 


104 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


now. No, the clock in the office is striking; it 
is just nine. Would she recognize the sum- 
mons? Assuredly; for with the last stroke she 
lifts the latch of her door and comes out. 

She has exchanged her dark dress for a light 
one and has arranged her hair in the manner 
he likes best. But he scarcely notes these 
changes in the interest he feels in her intentions 
and the manner in which she proceeds to carry 
out her purpose. 

She does not advance at once to the staircase, 
but creeps first to her sister’s door, where she 
stands listening for a minute or so in an atti- 
tude of marked anxiety. Then, with a gesture 
expressive of repugnance and alarm, she steps 
quickly forward and disappears down the 
staircase without vouchsafing one glance in 
his direction. 

His vision of her as she looked in that short 
passage from room to staircase was momentary 
only, but it left him shuddering. Never before 
had he seen resolve burning to a white heat 
in the human countenance. There was some- 
thing abnormal in it, taken with his knowledge 
of her face in its happier and more wholesome 
aspects. The innocent, affectionate young girl, 
whose soul he had looked upon as a weeded 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 105 

garden, had become in a moment to his eyes 
a suffering, determined, deeply concentrated 
woman of unsuspected power and purpose. 
A suggestion of wildness in her air added to 
the mysterious impression she made; an im- 
pression which rendered this instant memorable 
to him and set his pulses beating to a tune 
quite new to them. What was she going to 
do? Sign away all her property? Beggar her 
heirs for — He could not say what. No; 
even such a resolution could not account for 
her remarkable expression of concentrated will. 
There was in her distracted mind something of 
more tragic import than this; and he dared not 
question what; dared not even approach this 
woman who, less than a week before, had 
linked herself to him for life. The uneasy light 
in those fixed and gleaming eyes betrayed a 
reason too lightly poised. He feared any addi- 
tional shock for her. Better that she should 
go down undisturbed to her adviser, who bore a 
reputation which insured a judicious use of 
his power. What if she were about to will 
away her fortune to the man she called brother? 
He himself had no use for her wealth. Her 
health and happiness were all that concerned 
him, and these possibly depended on her being 


106 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


allowed to go her own way without interference. 
But oh, for eyes to see into the room into which 
she had withdrawn with the lawyer! For eyes 
to see into her heart! For eyes to see into the 
future! 

His suspense presently became so great that 
he could no longer control himself. Throwing 
up the window, he thrust his head out into the 
rain and felt refreshed by the icy drops falling 
on his face and neck. But the roar of the 
waterfall rang too persistently in his ears and 
he hastily closed the window again. There 
was something in the incessant boom of that 
tumbling water which strangely disturbed him. 
He could better stand suspense than that. If 
only the wind would bluster again. That, at 
least, was intermittent in its fury and gave 
momentary relief to thoughts strained to an 
unbearable tension. 

Afterwards, only a short time afterwards, 
he wondered that he had given himself over to 
such extreme feeling at this especial moment. 
Her appearance when she came quietly back, 
with Mrs. Deo chatting and smiling behind 
her, was natural enough, and though she did 
not speak herself, the tenor of the landlady's 
remarks was such as to show that they had been 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


107 


conversing about old days when the two little 
girls used to ransack her cupboards for their 
favorite cookies, and when their united pranks 
were the talk of the town. 

As they passed down the hall, Mrs. Deo 
garrulously remarked : 

“You were never separated except on that 
dreadful day of the schoolhouse burning. 
That day you were sick and — 

“Please!’^ The word leaped from Georgian 
in terror, and she almost threw her hand against 
the othePs mouth. “I — I canT bear it.’’ 

The good lady paused, gurgled an apology, 
and stooped for the tray which disfigured the 
sightliness of the neatly kept hall. Then, nod- 
ding towards a maid whom she had placed on 
watch at the extreme end of the hall, she 
muttered some assurances as to this woman’s 
faithfulness, and turned away with a cordial 
good night. Georgian watched her go with a 
strange and lingering intentness, or so it seemed 
to Ransom; then slowly entered her room and 
locked the door. 

The incidents of the day, so far as she was 
concerned, appeared to be at an end. 


CHAPTER XI 

HALF-PAST ONE IN THE MORNING 

Nothing now held Mr. Ransom to his room. 
The two women in whose fate he was so nearly 
concerned, his sister-in-law and his wife, had 
both retired and there was no other eye he 
feared. Indeed, he courted an interview with 
the lawyer, if only it could be naturally ob- 
tained; and he had little reason to think it 
could not. So he went down-stairs. 

In a moment he seemed to have passed from 
the realm of dreams to that of reality. Here 
was no mystery. Here was life as he knew it. 
Walking boldly into the ofhce, he ran his eye 
over the half-dozen men who sat there and, 
picking out the lawyer from the rest, sauntered 
easily up to him and sat down. 

My name is Johnston,’’ said he. “ I’m 
from New York; like yourself, I believe.” 

The lawyer, with a twinkle in his light-blue 
eye, answered with a cordial nod; and in two 
minutes a lively conversation had begun be- 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


109 


tween them on purely impersonal subjects 
suited to the intelligence of the crowd they 
were in. This did not last, however. An 
opportunity soon came for them to stroll off 
together, and presently Mr. Ransom found 
himself closeted with this man who he had 
reason to believe was the sole holder of the key 
to the secret which was devouring him. 

A bottle of wine was on the table between 
them, and some cigars. As Mr. Ransom filled 
the two glasses, he spoke: 

I have to thank you — ” he began, but saw 
immediately that he had made a wrong start. 

^‘For what, Mr. Johnston?^^ asked the other 
coldly. 

“ For giving me this opportunity to speak 
alone with you,^’ Ransom explained with a 
nervous gesture. An hour of unrestrained 
gossip is so necessary to me after a day of hard 
work. Perhaps you donT know that I am an 
author — have been one for seven whole hours. 
I find it exhausting. You could give me great 
relief by talking a little on some foreign sub- 
ject, say on the one now engrossing every one 
in the house, the twin ladies from New York. 
You were in the same coach with them. Did 
they quarrel and did the most wilful of the two 


no 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


insist on getting out at the foot of the hill and 
walking up through the lane?’^ 

I doubt if I have anything to say to Mr. 
Johnston on this subject/^ was the wary reply. 

^^What if he added another name to the 
Johnston?” 

It would make no appreciable difference. 
The driver is a loquacious fellow, talk to him.” 

Mr. Ransom felt his heart fail him. He sur- 
veyed closely the mouth which had uttered 
this off-hand sentence and saw that it was set 
in a line there was no mistaking. Little en- 
lightenment was to be got from this man. Yet 
he made one more effort. 

“ Did my wife sign the will?” he asked. All 
pretense aside, this is a very important matter 
to me, Mr. Harper; not on account of the 
money involved, but because the doing of this 
simple act seemed to require such an effort on 
her part.” 

“You are mistaken,” was the quick reply, 
harshly accentuated. “She did just what she 
wanted to do. She was not in the least coerced, 
unless it was by circumstances.” 

“Circumstances! But that is what I mean. 
They seem to have been too much for her. I 
want to understand these circumstances.” 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


111 


The lawyer honored him with his first direct 
look. 

I donT understand them myself/^ said he. 

“You donT?^^ 

“ No.” 

Mr. Ransom set down the wineglass he had 
raised half-way to his lips. 

“ You have simply followed her orders?” 

“You have said it. Your wife is a woman 
of much more character than you think. She 
has amazed me.” 

“ She is amazing me. I am here; she is here; 
only a few boards separate us. But iron bars 
could not be more effectual. I dare not ap- 
proach her door; dare not ask her to accept 
from me the natural protection of a lover and 
husband. Instinct holds me back, or her will, 
which may not be stronger than mine but is 
certainly more dominant..” 

“ Lawyers do not believe much in instinct 
as a usual thing, but I should advise confidence 
in this one. A woman with a tremendous will 
like that of Mrs. Ransom should be allowed a 
slack tether. The day will arrive when she 
will come to you herself. This I have said be- 
fore; I can say nothing more to you to-night.” 

“ Then there is nothing in the will you have 


112 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


drawn up to show that she has lost her affection 
for me?’' 

The lawyer drained his glass. 

“ I have not been given permission to declare 
its terms,” said he, when his glass was again 
upon the table. 

In other words, I am to know nothing,” 
exclaimed his exasperated companion. 

“ Not from me.” 

And this ended the conversation. Ransom 
withdrew immediately up-stairs. 

At ten o’clock he retired. The last look he 
cast down the hall had shown him the drowsy 
figure of the maid still sitting at her watch. It 
seemed to insure a peaceful night. But he had 
little expectation of sleep. Though the wind 
had quieted down and the rain fell with in- 
creasing gentleness, the roar of the waterfall 
surged through all his thoughts, which in them- 
selves were turbulent. He did sleep, however, 
slept peacefully till half-past one, when he and 
all in the house were startled by a wild and 
"vpiercing cry rising from one of the rooms. 
Terror was in the sound and in an instant every 
door was open save the two which were shut 
upon Georgian and her twin sister. 


CHAPTER XII 


Georgian!’’ 

Mr. Ransom was the first one in the hall. 
He had not undressed himself, expecting a 
totally sleepless night. It was his figure, then, 
that the maid encountered as she came running 
from her post at the end of the corridor. 

“Which room? which?” he gasped out, 
ignoring every precaution in his blind terror. 

“This one. I am sure it came from this 
one,” she declared, knocking loudly on Anitra’s 
door. 

There was a rustle within, a cry which was 
half a sob, then the sound of a hand fumbling 
with the lock. Meanwhile, Mr. Ransom had 
bent his ear to his wife’s door. 

“ All still in here,” he cried. “ Not a sound. 
Something dreadful has happened — ” 

Just then Anitra’s door fell back and a wild 
image confronted him and such others as had 
by this time collected in the passageway. 
With only a shawl covering her nightdress, the 


114 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


gipsy-like creature stood clawing the air and 
answering the looks that appealed to her, with 
wild gurgles, till suddenly her hot glances fell 
on Roger Ransom, when she instantly became 
rigid and stammered out: 

“She's gone! I saw her black figure go by 
my window. She called out that the water- 
fall drew her. She went by the little balcony 
and the roof. The roof was slippery with the 
rain and she fell. That's why I screamed. 
But she got up again. What is she going to do 
at the waterfall? Stop her! stop her! She 
hasn't steady feet like me, and I wasn't really 
angry. I liked her; I liked her." 

Sobs choked the rest. Her terror was in- 
fectious. Mr. Ransom reeled, then flung him- 
self at Georgian's door. It resisted but the 
silence within told him that she was not there. 
Neither was she in Anitra's room. They could 
all look in and see it bare to the window. 

“ You saw her climbing past there?" he cried, 
forgetting she was deaf. 

“ Yes, yes," she chattered, catching his mean- 
ing from his pointing finger. “ There's a bal- 
cony. She must have jumped on it from her 
own window. She didn't come in here. See! 
the door is locked on her side." 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


115 


This was true. 

“I woke and saw her. My eyes are like 
lynxes. I got out of bed to watch. She fell — 

The noise of a breaking lock snapped her 
words in two. One of the men present had 
flung himself against this communicating door. 
Immediately they all crowded into the adjoin- 
ing room. It was empty and bitterly cold 
and wet. An open window explained why, 
and possibly the letter lying on the bureau 
inscribed with her husband’s name would ex- 
plain the rest. But he stopped to read no 
letters now. 

“ Show me the way to those falls,” he cried, 
pocketing the letter as he rushed by the di- 
sheveled Anitra into the open hall. I’m her 
husband, Roger Ransom. Who goes with me? 
He who does is my friend for life.” 

The clerk and one or two others rushed for 
their coats and lanterns. He waited for 
nothing. The roar of the waterfall had told 
him too many tales that day. And the will! 
Her will just signed! 

Georgian!” 

They could hear his cry. 

Georgian! Georgian! Wait! wait! hear 
what I have to say!” thrilled back through the 


116 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


mist as he stumbled on, followed by the men 
waving their lanterns and shouting words of 
warning he probably never heard. Then his 
cry further off and fainter. “Georgian! 
Georgian!” Then silence and the slow drizzle 
of rain on the soggy walk and soaked roofs, with 
the far-off boom of the waterfall which Mrs. 
Deo and the trembling maids gazing at the 
wide-eyed Anitra shivering in the center of her 
deserted room, tried to shut out by closing 
window and blind, forgetting that she was deaf 
and only heard such echoes as were thunder- 
ing in her own mind. 


CHAPTER XIII 


WHERE THE MILL STREAM RUNS FIERCEST 

Two o’clock. 

Three o’clock. 

Two men were talking below their breaths 
in the otherwise empty office. That ’ere mill 
stream never gives up anything it has once 
caught,” muttered one into the ear of the 
other. “ It’s swift as fate and in certain places 
deep as hell. Dutch Jan’s body was five 
months at the bottom of it, before it came up at 
Clark’s pool.” 

The man beside him shivered and his hand 
roamed nervously towards his breast. 

^^Did Jan, the Dutchman you speak of, fall 
in by accident, or did he — throw himself over 
— from homesickness, or some such cause?” 

“Wa’al we don’t say; on account of his old 
mother, you know, we don’t say. It was called 
accident.” 

The other man rose and walked restlessly to 
the window. 


118 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


“ Half the town is up,” he muttered. “ The 
lanterns go by like fire-flies. Poor Ransom! 
IPs a hopeless job, I fear.” And again his 
hand wandered to that breast pocket where 
the edge of a document could be seen. “ I 
have half a mind to go out myself; anything is 
better than sitting here.” 

But he sat down just the same. Mr. Harper 
was no longer a young man. 

“ The storm’s bating,” observed the one. 

“But not the cold. Throw on a stick; Pm 
freezing.” 

The other man obeyed; then looking up, 
stared. A girl stood before them in the door- 
way. Anitra, with cheeks ablaze and eyes 
burning, her traveling dress flapping damp 
about her heels, and on her head the red 
shawl she preferred to any hat. Behind her 
shoulder peered the anxious face of Mrs. 
Deo. 

“ Pm going out,” cried the former in the 
loud and unmodulated voice of the deaf. ^^He 
don’t come back! he don’t come back! I’m 
going to see why.” 

The lawyer rose and bowed; then resolutely 
shook his head. He did not know whether she 
had appealed to him or not. She had not 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 119 

looked at him, had not looked at any one, but 
he felt that he must protest. 

beg you not to do so,’’ he began. "I 
really beg you to remain here and wait with 
me. You can do no good and the result may 
be dangerous.” But he knew he was talking 
to deaf ears even before the landlady mur- 
mured : 

She doesn’t hear a word. I’ve talked and 
talked to her. I’ve used every sign and motion 
I could think of, but it’s done no good. She 
would dress and she will go out; you’ll see.” 

The next minute her prophecy came true; 
the wild thing, with a quick whirl of her lithe 
body, was at the front door, and in another 
instant had flashed through it and was gone. 

“It is my duty to follow her,” said the 
lawyer. “Help me on with my coat; I’ll find 
some one to guide me.” 

“ Here is a lantern. Excuse me for not going 
with you,” pleaded Mrs. Deo, “but some one 
must watch the house.” 

The New Yorker nodded, took the lantern 
offered him, and went stoically out. 

He met a man on the walk in front. He 
was faced his way and was panting heavily. 

“Hello,” said hC; ‘^what news?” 


120 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


^^They haven’t found her; but there’s no 
doubt she went over the fall. The fellow who 
calls himself her husband has just been reading 
a letter they say she left on her bureau for 
him. It was a good-by, I reckon, for you 
can’t tear him from the spot. He says he’ll 
stay there till daylight. I couldn’t stand the 
sight of his misery myself. Besides, it’s mortal 
cold; I’ve just been running to get warm. 
Who was the girl who just went scurrying by 
out of here? It’s no place for wimmen down 
there. One lost gal is enough.” 

“ That’s what I think,” muttered the lawyer, 
hurrying on. 

He was not a very imaginative man; some of 
his best friends thought him a cold and prosaic 
one, but he never forgot that walk or the 
sensations accompanying it. Dark as it still 
was, the way would have been impassable for 
a stranger, had it not been for the guidance 
given by the noisy passing to and fro of the 
awakened townspeople. Those coming from 
the river approached in a direct line from one 
spot; those going to it advanced in the same 
line and to the same spot. A ring of lanterns 
marked it. It was near, very near where the 
heavy waters fell into a deep pool. No one 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


121 


now spoke of Anitra; she had evidently been 
warned by her first encounter to move with 
less precipitancy. 

As he approached the place of central in- 
terest, he moved more warily too. The ground 
was very bad; he had never walked in such 
slush. Once and again he tripped; once he 
came down upon his face. The boom of the 
waters was now very near; he could see nothing 
but the flicker of the lanterns, but he felt the 
near rush of the stream, and presently was at 
its very edge. Startled by the nearness of his 
escape, for he had almost lost his footing by 
his sudden halt, he started back, looked again 
at the lanterns, took a turn and came upon the 
dozen or more men bending over the edge of 
the stream where the waters ran most swiftly. 
But he did not join them. Another sight 
attracted his eyes and presently himself. This 
was the sight of Ransom crouched on the wet 
earth, staring down at a slip of paper he held 
in his hands. A lantern set in the sand at his 
feet sent its feeble rays over his face and pos- 
sibly over the paper; but he was no longer 
reading it, he was simply so lost in its sorrow- 
ful contents that all power of movement had 
deserted him, 


122 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


Harper approached to his side, but he did 
not address him. Something stirred in his 
own breast and kept him silent. But there 
was another person near who was not so de- 
terred. As Harper stood watching Ransom^s 
crouched, almost insensible figure, he perceived 
a slight dark form steal from the shadows and 
lay a hand on the stooping man’s shoulder, 
then as he failed to move or give any token of 
feeling this touch, he heard Anitra’s voice say 
in accents almost musical: 

^^You will get ill here; you are not used to 
the cold and the night air. Come back to the 
house; Georgian would wish it.” 

The name roused him and he looked up. 
Their eyes met and a strange gleam — a shock, 
perhaps, of sympathetic feeling, hashed upon 
either face. The lawyer saw and instinctively 
retreated from out the circle of light cast by 
the lantern; but the men at the stream’s edge 
heard nothing. The flash of something white 
had caught their eyes and one man was reach- 
ing for it. 

Georgian,” came in astonished repetition 
from the bereaved man’s lips. 

“She would wish it,” persisted the other 
with still deeper and more urgent meaning. 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


123 


Then in a whisper so penetrating that even 
Mr. Harper caught its least inflection through 
all the thunder of the waterfall, ^^She loved 
you.'' 

Ah! the enchantment, the feminine per- 
suasiveness, the heart-moving sincerity which 
breathed through that simple phrase! From 
lips so untutored, it seemed marvelous. Ran- 
som was not insensible to its power, for he 
quivered under her hand and his eyes took on a 
look of wonder. But he made no attempt to 
answer, even by a sign. He seemed content 
for that one instant just to listen and to look. 

The man hanging over the stream drew 
back his arm. He had been deceived by a bit 
of froth; some of it clung yet to his Angers. 

Come," entreated the girl, her face emerging 
softly into the light, as she stooped lower over 
the lantern. ^^Come!" she had taken him by 
the hand and was drawing him gently upward. 

With a leap he was on his feet and had thrown 
her off. Some memory had come to make her 
entreaty hateful. 

“No," he cried, “no! Here is my place 
and here will I stay. You are a stranger to me! 
You drove her to this act, and you shall not 
cajole me into forgetting it." 


124 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


He had spoken loudly; not so much because 
he remembered her affliction, but because of 
the roar of the fall and his own overwhelming 
passion. The result was that the lawyer caught 
every word; possibly the workers at the water- 
edge did also; for some of them quickly turned 
their heads. But she, though she stopped 
short in the • spot where he had pushed her, 
gave no evidence of hearing his words or even 
of resenting his manner. 

“WonT you come?^^ she falteringly pleaded, 
pointing towards the house with its twinkling 
lights. ^^You are cold; you are shuddering; 
they will do the searching who don’t mind 
night or wet. Follow Anitra, Anitra who is so 
sorry.” 

^^No!” he shouted. His tone, his look, were 
almost those of a madman. He even put out 
his hands towards her in repulsion. He seemed 
to cast her away. This gesture, if not his 
words, reached her understanding. The lawyer 
saw her sway, fling back her young head with 
its disheveled locks to the night, and fall 
moaning pitifully to the ground. Here she 
lay still, with the wet grass all about her and 
the last lingering drops of rain beating on her 
huddled form. 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


125 


Mr. Harper started to raise her, for Ransom 
stood petrified. But no sooner had the lawyer 
made his presence known by this impetuous 
movement, than Ransom woke from his trance 
and, darting; down, lifted the girl in his arms 
and began moving with her towards the house. 
As he passed the lawyer he muttered between 
set teeth: 

“She’s caused me all my misery. But she 
looks too much like Georgian for me to see 
another man touch her. God will care for my 
poor darling’s body.” 


CHAPTER XIV 

A DETECTIVE^S WORK 

Morning. 

The living household was about its tasks for 
all the horror of the night before, and the still 
unrelieved suspense as to the fate of one of its 
members. 

The maid, who had sat on watch in the upper 
hall for so many hours the evening before, was 
again at her post, but this time with her eye 
fixed only on one door, the door behind which 
slept the exhausted Anitra. Ransom^s room 
was empty; he was in the sitting-room below, 
closeted with the lawyer. 

Some one had been there before them. The 
tray of bottles and glasses had been removed 
from the table, and in their place were to be 
seen a woman’s damaged hat and a small tor- 
toise-shell comb. Mr. Harper’s hand was on 
the former, which was wound about with a wet 
veil. 

think I recognize this,” said he. ‘^At 


THE CALL OP THE WATERFALL 127 

least I have a distinct impression of having 
seen it before/^ 

“ It was picked up with the veil stiU on it near 
the entrance of the lane,” explained Ransom. 

^^Then there can be no doubt that it is the 
hat Miss Hazen wore during her journey. She 
tossed it off the moment her foot touched the 
ground, and taking the shawl from her neck 
pulled it over her head instead. You remember 
that she had no hat on when they brought her 
in.” 

“ I remember. This is Miss Hazen^s hat with- 
out any doubt.” 

The lawyer eyed the speaker with curious 
interest. There was something in his tone that 
he did not understand. 

And this?” he ventured, laying a respectful 
finger on the comb. 

“ Found in the open field between the house 
and the mill-stream.” 

Do you recognize it?” 

“ No. Georgian wore such combs, but I 
cannot absolutely say that this is hers.” 

I can. You see this little gold work at the 
top? Well, I have an eye for such things and 
I noticed this comb in her hair last night. 
There were two of them just alike.” 


128 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


Instinctively the two men sat with their 
eyes fixed for a minute on this comb, then, 
equally instinctively, they both looked up 
and gazed at each other long and hard. It 
was the lawyer who first spoke. 

I think that we should have no further 
secrets between us,’^ said he. “Here is Mrs. 
Ransom^s will. There is a name mentioned 
in it which I do not know. Perhaps you do.’^ 
Here he laid the document on the table. 

Mr. Ransom eyed it but did not take it up. 
Instead, he drew a crumpled paper from his 
own pocket and, handing it to the lawyer, said : 
“First, I should like you to read the letter 
which she left behind for me. My feelings as a 
husband would lead me to hold it as a sacred 
legacy from all eyes but my own; but there is a 
mystery hidden in it, a mystery which I must 
penetrate, and you are the only man who can 
assist me in doing so.’’ 

The lawyer, lowering his eyes to hide their 
own suspicious glint, opened the paper, and 
carefully read these lines : 

“Forgive. My troubles are too much for 
me. I’m going to a place of rest, the only 
place and the only rest possible to one in my 


THE CALL OF THE W'ATERFALL 


129 


position. I don’t blame anybody. Least of 
all do I blame Anitra. It was not her fault 
that she was brought up rudely, or that she 
knows no restraint in love or in hate. Be kind 
to her for my sake, and if any one else claims 
her or offers to take her from you, resist them. 
I give her entirely to you. It’s a more price- 
less gift than you think; much more priceless 
than the one which I take from you by my 
death. I could never have been happy with 
you; you could never have been happy with me. 
Fate stood between us; a darker and more 
inexorable fate than you, in your kindly ex- 
perience of life, could imagine. Else, why do 
I plunge to my death with your ring on my 
finger and your love in my heart? 

Georgian.” 

“Ravings?” questioned Ransom hoarsely, as 
Mr. Harper’s eyes rose again to his face. 

“ It wouI.d seem so,” assented the lawyer. 
“ Yet there is intelligence in all the lines. And 
the will — read the will. There is no lack of 
intelligent purpose there; little as it accords 
with the feeling she exhibits here for her sister. 
She leaves her nothing; and does not even 
mention her name. Her personal belongings 


130 


THE C HIEF LEGATEE 


she bequeaths to you; but her realty, which 
comprises the bulk of her property I believe, 
she divides, somewhat unequally I own, be- 
tween you and a man named Auchincloss. It 
is he I want to ask you about. Have you ever 
heard her speak of him?^’ 

“ Josiah Auchincloss of St. Louis, Missouri,^’ 
read Mr. Ransom. No,^^ the name is new to 
me. Didn^t she tell you anything about him 
when she gave you her instructions?^^ 

“ Not a word. She said, ^ You will hear from 
him if ever this will is published. He has a 
right to the money and I entreat you to show 
your respect for me by seeing that he gets it 
without any unnecessary trouble.’ That was 
all she said or would say. Your wife was a 
woman of powerful character, Mr. Ransom. 
My little arts counted for nothing in any dif- 
ference of opinion between us.” 

“ Auchincloss ! ” repeated Ransom. “ Another 
unknown quantity in the problem of my poor 
girl’s life. What a tangle! Do you wonder 
that I am overcome by it? Anitra — the so- 
called brother — and now this Auchincloss!” 

Right, Ransom, I share your confusion.” 
“Do you?” The words came very slowly, 
penetratingly. “ Haven’t you some idea — 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


131 


some strange, possibly half-formed notion or 
secret intuition which might afford some clew 
to this labyrinth? I have been told that 
lawyers have a knack of getting at the bottom 
of human conduct and affairs. You have had 
a wide experience; does it not suggest some 
answer to this problem which will harmonize 
all its discordant elements and make clear its 
various complications?^^ 

Mr. Harper shook his head, but there was a 
restrained excitement in his manner which was 
not altogether the reflectiou of that which domi- 
nated Ransom, and the latter, observing it, 
leaned across the table till their faces almost 
touched. 

^^Do you guess my thought? he whispered. 

Look at me and tell me if you guess my 
thought.^ ^ 

The lawyer hesitated, eying well the trem- 
bling lip, the changing color, the wide-open, 
deeply flushed eyes so near his own; then with 
a slow smile of extraordinary subtlety, if not 
of comprehension, answered in a barely audible 
murmur : 

I think I do. I may be mad, but I think 
I do.^^ 

The other sank back with a sigh charged 


132 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


with what the lawyer interpreted as relief. 
Mr. Harper reseated himself, and for a moment 
neither looked at the other, and neither spoke; 
it would almost seem as if neither breathed. 
Then, as a bird, deceived by the silence, hopped 
to the window sill and began its cheep, cheep,’’ 
Mr. Ransom broke the spell by saying in low 
but studiously business-like tones: 

“ Have you thought it worth while to study 
the ground under her window or anywhere 
else for footprints? It might not be amiss; 
what do you think about it?” 

Let us go,” readily acquiesced the lawyer, 
rising to his feet with an honest show of alac- 
rity; after which I must telegraph to New 
York. I was expected back to-day.” 

I know it; but your duties there will keep; 
these here cannot. Your hand on the promise 
that you will respect my secret till — well, till 
I can assure you that my intuitions are devoid 
of any real basis.” 

The lawyer’s palm met his; then they 
started to go out; but before they had passed 
the door, Mr. Ransom came back, and lifting 
the comb from the table he put it in his pocket. 
As he did this, his eye flashed sidewise on the 
other. There were strange hints and presenti- 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


133 


ments in it which brought the color to the 
usually imperturbable lawyer^s cheek. 

In going out they passed the office-door. A 
dozen men were hanging about, smoking and 
talking. Among them was a countryman who 
had just swallowed, open-mouthed, the story of 
the past night^s tragedy. He was now speaking 
out his own mind concerning it, and this is what 
these two heard him say as they went by: 

“Do you know what strikes me as mighty 
strange? That they should clear that stone of 
the name of Anitra just in time to put Georgian's 
in its place. I call that peculiar, I do.” 

The lawyer and the husband exchanged a 
glance. 

“ Mrs. Ransom had a deep mind,” the lawyer 
remarked, as the door slammed behind them. 
“She apparently thought of everything.” 

Ransom, directing a look down the street 
towards the factories and the roaring mill- 
stream, uttered a shuddering sigh. 

“They are still searching,” said he. “But 
they will never find her. They will never find 
her.” 

The lawyer pulled him away. 

“ That’s because they search the water. We 
will search the land.” 


134 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


“That’s half water, too; but it cannot hide 
every clew. You have eyes for the imper- 
ceptible; use them, Mr. Harper, use them.” 

“ I will; but this is a detective’s work. Do 
not expect too much from me.” 

“ I expect nothing. I do not dare to. Let 
us tread very softly, that is all, and be careful 
to talk low, if we have anything to say.” 

By this time they had rounded the corner 
of the house and entered a narrow walk, flagged 
with brick, which connected the space in front 
with the rear offices and garden. This walk 
ran close to the walls which were broken on 
this side by an ell projecting in the direction 
of the mill-stream. It was from the roof of 
this ell that Anitra declared Georgian to have 
slipped and fallen. 

Their first care was to glance up at the roof. 
It was a sloping one and Anitra’s story seemed 
credible enough when they noted how much 
easier it would be to drop upon it from the 
little balcony overhead than to traverse the 
roof itself and reach the ground beneath with- 
out slipping. But as they looked longer, each 
face betrayed doubt. The descent from the 
balcony was easy enough, but how about the 
passage from Georgian’s window to the bal- 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


135 


cony? This latter was confined to the one 
window, and was surrounded by an ornamental 
balustrade, high enough to offer a decided 
obstacle to the adventurous person endeavor- 
ing to leap upon it from the adjoining window- 
ledge. However, this leap, made in the dark 
and under circumstances inducing the utmost 
recklessness, might look practical enough from 
the window-ledge itself, and Mr. Harper, mak- 
ing a remark to this effect, proposed that they 
should examine the ground rather than the 
house for evidences of Mrs. Ransom’s slip and 
fall as related by Anitra. 

The only spot where they could hope to find 
such was in the one short stretch — the width 
of the ell — underlying the edge of the sloping 
roof. But this spot was all flagged, as I have 
already said, and when their eyes strayed 
beyond it to the untilled fields, stretching 
between them and the great rock at the verge 
of the waterfall from which she was supposed 
to have taken her fatal leap, it was to find them 
as unproductive of evidence as the brick walk 
itself. Not one pair of feet but many had passed 
that way since early morning. The ground 
showed a mass of impressions of all sizes and 
shapes, amid which it would have been im- 


136 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


possible for them, without the necessary ex- 
perience, to have followed up the flight of any 
one person. They had come to their task too 
late. 

“ Futile,’^ decided the lawyer. “ There is 
no use in our going that way.’’ And he turned 
to look again at the ground in their immediate 
vicinity. As he did so, his eye lighted on the 
triangular spot where the ell met the side of 
the house under the kitchen windows. Here 
there was no flagging, the walk taking a diagonal 
course from the corner of the ell to the kitchen 
door. 

^^What are those?” he asked, pointing to 
two oblong impressions brimming with water 
which disfigured the center of this small plot. 

“They look like footprints,” ventured Ran- 
som. 

“They are footprints,” decided Mr. Harper 
as they stooped to examine the marks, “ and 
the footprints of a person dropping from a 
height. Nothing else explains their depth or 
general appearance.” 

“ Couldn’t they be those of a person approach- 
ing the ell to converse with some one above? 
I see others similar to these in the open place 
over there beyond the kitchen door.” 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


137 


“ It is a trail. Let us follow it. It seems to 
lead anywhere but towards the waterfall. This 
is an important discovery, Mr. Ransom, and 
may lead to conclusions such as we might not 
otherwise have presumed to entertain, espe- 
cially if we come upon an impression clear 
enough to point in which direction the person 
making it was going.^’ 

“Here is what you want,^^ Ransom assured 
him in a low and curiously smothered voice. 
He was evidently greatly excited by this result 
of their inquiries, for all his apparent quiet 
and precise movements. “ It^s a woman’s step, 
and that woman was going from the ell when 
she left these tokens of her passage behind her. 
Going! and as you say not in the direction of 
the waterfall.” 

“Hush! I see some one at the kitchen 
window. Let us move warily and be sure not 
to confound these prints with those of any 
other person. It looks as if a great many 
people had passed here.” 

“Yes, this is the way to the chicken-coops 
and out-houses. But in the ground beyond I 
think I see a single line of steps again, — small 
steps like these. Where can they be leading? 
They are deep like those of a person running.” 


138 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


“ And straggling, like those of a person run- 
ning in the dark. See how they waver from 
the direct line down there, turn, and almost 
come up against that wood-pile! Whose steps 
are these? Whose, Mr. Harper? Quick! I 
must see where they go. Our time will not be 
lost. The key to the labyrinth is in our 
hands.’’ 

The lawyer was in the rear and the eyes of 
the other were fixed far ahead. For this 
reason, perhaps, the former allowed himself 
a quiet shake of the head, which might not 
have encouraged the other so very much, had 
he caught sight of it. They were now on the 
verge of the garden, or what would soon be a 
garden if these rains betokened spring. A path 
ran along its edge and in this path the foot- 
steps they were following lost themselves; but 
they came upon them again among the hillocks 
of some old potato-hills beyond, and finally 
traced them quite across the garden waste to 
a fence, along which they ran, blundering from 
ploughed earth to spots of smoother ground, 
and so back again till they came upon an old 
turn-stile ! 

Passing through this, the two men stopped 
and looked about them. They were in a road 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


139 


ridged with grass and flanked by bushes. One 
end ran east into a wooded valley, the other 
debouched on the highway a few feet to the 
right of the tavern. 

“The lane!’^ exclaimed Mr. Harper. “The 
lead towards the waterfall was a feint. It was 
in this direction she fled, and it is from this 
point that search must be made for her.” 

Ransom, greatly perturbed, for this possi- 
bility of secret flight opened vistas of as much 
mystery, if not of as much suffering, as her 
death in the river, glanced at the sodden 
ground under their feet, and thus along the 
lane to where it lost itself from view among 
the trees. 

“No possible following of steps here,” he 
declared. “ A hundred people must have come 
this way since early morning.” 

“ It^s a short cut from the Ferry. They told 
me last night that it lessened the distance by 
fully a quarter of a mile.” 

“The Ferry! Can she be there? Or in the 
woods, or on her way to some unknown place 
far out of our reach? The thought is madden- 
ing, Mr. Harper, and I feel as helpless as a 
child under it. Shall we get detectives from 
the county-seat, or start on the hunt ourselves? 


140 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


We might hear something further on to help 
us” 

“We might; but I should rather stay on the 
immediate scene at present. Ah, there comes 
a fellow in a cart who should be able to tell us 
something! Stand by and Til accost him. 
You needn’t show your face.” 

Mr. Ransom turned aside. Mr. Harper waited 
till the slow-moving horse, dragging a heavily 
jogging wagon, came alongside, and he had 
caught the eye of the low-browed, broad-faced 
farmer boy who sat on a bag of potatoes and 
held the reins. 

“Good morning,” said he. “Bad news this 
way. Any better at the Ferry, or down east, 
as you call it?” 

“Eh?” was the lumbering, half-suspidous 
answer from the startled boy. “ Fve heard 
naught down yonder, but that a gal threw her- 
self over the waterfall up here last night. Is 
that a fact, sir? Fm mighty curus to know. My 
mother knew them Hazens; used to wash for 
’em years ago. She told me to bring up these 
taters and larn all I could about it.” 

“ We don’t know much more than that our- 
selves,” was the smooth and cautious reply. 
“ The lady certainly is missing, and she is sup- 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


141 


posed to have drowned herself.’’ Then, as he 
noted the fellow’s eyes resting with some 
curiosity on Mr. Ransom’s well-clad, gentle- 
manly figure, added gravely, and with a slight 
gesture towards the latter: 

The lady’s husband.” 

The lad’s jaw fell and he looked very sheep- 
ish. 

“Excuse me, misters, I didn’t know,” he 
managed to mutter, with a slash at his horse 
which was vainly endeavoring to pull the cart 
from the rut in which it had stuck. “ I guess 
I’ll go along to the hotel. I’ve a bag of taters 
for Mrs. Deo.” 

But the cart didn’t budge and the lawyer 
had time to say: 

“ Guess you didn’t hear anything said about 
another lady I am interested in. No talk down 
your way of a strange young woman seen any- 
where on the highway or about any of the 
houses between here and the Landing?” 

“Jerusha! I did hear a neighbor of mine 
say somethin’ about a stranger gal he saw this 
very mornin’. Met her down by Beardsley’s. 
She was goin’ through the mud on foot as lively 
as you please. Asked him the way to the Ferry. 
He noticed her because she was pretty and spoke 


142 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


in such a nice way — just like a city gal/^ he 
said. “ Is it any one from this hotel?’’ added 
the fellow with a wondering look. If so, she 
walked a mile before daylight in mud up to her 
ankles. A girl of powerful grit that! with a 
mighty good reason for catching the train.” 

“ Oh! there’s an early train then?” asked the 
lawyer, ignoring the other’s question with un- 
moved good-humor. One, I mean, before 
the 10:50 express?” 

Yes, sir, or so I’ve heard. I never took it. 
Folks don’t from here, except they’re in an 
awful hurry. Will y’er say who the young 
woman is? Not — not — ” 

^‘We don’t know who she is,” quietly ob- 
jected the lawyer. And you don’t know who 
she is either,” he severely added, holding the 
yawping countryman with his eye. If you’re 
the man I think you, you’ll not talk about her 
unless you’re asked by the constable or some 
one you are bound to answer. And what’s 
more, you’ll earn a five-dollar bill by going 
back the road you’ve come and bringing here, 
without any talk or fuss, the man you were just 
telling us about. I want to have a talk with 
him, but I don’t want any one but you and 
him to know this. You can tell him it’s worth 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


143 


money, if he don^t want to come. Do you 
understand? 

^^You bet,’^ chuckled the grinning lad. 
five-dollar bill is mighty clearing to the mind, 
sir. But must I turn right back before going 
on to the hotel and hearing the news?^’ 

We^ll help you turn the cart,’^ grimly sug- 
gested Mr. Harper. ^^Get up there, Dobbin, 
or whatever your name is. Here, Ransom, 
lend a hand!’’ 

There was nothing for the fellow to do but to 
accept the help proffered, and turn his cart. 
With one longing look towards the hotel he 
jerked at the rein and shouted at the horse, 
which, after a few feeble efforts, pulled the cart 
about and started off again in the desired 
direction. 

Sooner done, sooner paid,” shouted the 
lawyer, as lad and cart went jolting off. Re- 
member to ask for Lawyer Harper when you 
come back. I won’t be far from the office.” 

The fellow nodded* gave one grinning look 
back and whipped up his nag. The lawyer 
and Ransom eyed one another. “ It’s only a 
possibility,” emphasized the former. Don’t 
lay too much stress upon it.” 

Let us speak plainly,” urged Ransom. 


144 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


Mr. Harper, are you sure that you know just 
what my thought is?” 

The time has not come for discussing that 
question. Let us defer it. There is a fact to 
be settled first.” 

Whether the girl — ” 

“No; this! Whether your wife could have 
jumped from her window to the balcony, as 
Anitra said. It did not look feasible from 
below, but as I then remarked to you, our 
opinion may change when we consider it from 
above. Will you go up-stairs with me to your 
wife^s room?” 

“ I will go anywhere and do anything you 
please, so that we learn the exact truth. But 
spare me the curiosity of these people. The 
crowd on this side is increasing.” 

“We will go in by the kitchen door. Some 
one there will show us the way up-stairs.” 

And in this manner they entered; not escap- 
ing entirely all curious looks, for human nature 
is human nature, whether in the kitchen or 
parlor. 

In the hall above Mr. Ransom took the pre- 
cedence. As they neared the fatal room he 
motioned the lawyer to wait till he could ascer- 
tain if Miss Hazen would be disturbed by their 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


145 


intrusion. The door, which had been broken 
in between the two rooms, could not have 
been put back verj securely, and he dreaded 
incommoding her. He was gone but a minute. 
Almost as soon as the lawyer started to follow 
him, he could be seen beckoning from poor 
Georgian's door. 

^^Miss Hazen is asleep,’^ whispered Ransom, 
as the other drew near. ^^We can look about 
this room with impunity.^’ 

They both entered and the lawyer crossed 
at once to the window. 

“ Your wife could never have taken the leap 
ascribed to her by the woman you call Anitra,” 
he declared, after a minute^s carefu scrutiny of 
the conditions. The balustrade oi the adjoin- 
ing balcony is not only in the way, but the 
distance is at least five feet from the extreme 
end of this window-ledge. A woman accus- 
tomed to a life of adventure or to the feats of 
a gymnasium might do it, but not a lady of 
Mrs. Ransom’s habits. If your wife made her 
way from this room to the balcony outside her 
sister’s window, she did it by means of the 
communicating door. 

But the door was found locked on this side. 
There is the key in the lock now.” 


146 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


“You are sure of this?” 

“ I was the first one to call attention to it.” 

“Then,” began the lawyer judicially, but 
stopped as he noted the peculiar eagerness of 
Ransom^s expression, and turned his attention 
instead to the interior of the room and the 
various articles belonging to Mrs. Ransom 
which were to be seen in it. “ The dress your 
wife wore when she signed her will,” he re- 
marked, pointing to the light green gown hang- 
ing on the inside of the door by which they had 
entered. 

Ransom stepped up to it, but did not touch 
it. He could see her as she looked in this 
gown in her memorable passage through the 
hall the evening before, and, recalling her ex- 
pression, wondered if they yet understood the 
nature of her purpose and the determination 
which gave it such extraordinary vigor. 

Mr. Harper called his attention to two other 
articles of dress hanging in another part of 
the room. These were her long gray rain-coat 
and the hat and veil she had worn on the 
train. 

“ She went out bare-headed and in the plain 
serge dress in which she arrived,” remarked 
Mr. Harper with a side glance at Ransom. 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


147 


I wonder if the girl met on the highway was 
without hat and dressed in black serge.” 

Ransom was silent. 

“ Anitra’s hat is below and here is Mrs. Ran- 
som^s. She who escaped from this house last 
night went out bare-headed,” repeated the 
lawyer. 

Mr. Ransom, moving aside to avoid the 
probing of the other’s eye, merely remarked: 

“You noticed my wife’s dress very particu- 
larly it seems. It was of serge, you say.” 

“ Yes. I am learned in stuffs. I remarked it 
when she got into the coach, possibly because 
I was struck by its simplicity and conventional 
make. There was no trimming on the bottom, 
only stitching. Her sister’s was just like it. 
They had the look of being ready-made.” 

“ But Anitra had no rain-coat. I remember 
that her shoulders were wet when she came in 
from the lane.” 

“ No, she had no protection but her blouse, 
black like her dress. I presume that her hot 
blood resented every kind of wrap.” 

Again that sidelong glance from his keen eye. 
“ She wore a checked silk handkerchief about 
her neck — the one she afterwards put over 
her head.” 


148 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


^^You were on the same train with my wife 
and sister-in-law,” Ransom now said. Did 
you sit near them? Converse with them, that 
is, with Mrs. Ransom?” 

I have no reason for deceiving you in that 
regard,” replied Mr. Harper. I did not come 
up from New York on the same train they did. 
They must have come up in the morning, for 
when I arrived at the place they call the Ferry, 
I saw them standing on the hotel steps ready 
to step into the coach. I spoke to Mrs. Ran- 
som then, but only a word. My grip-sack had 
been put under the driver^s seat, and I saw 
that I was expected to ride with him, notwith- 
standing the inclemency of the weather. Mrs. 
Ransom saw it too and possibly my natural 
hesitation, for she turned to me after she had 
seen her sister safely ensconced inside, and said 
something about her regret at having sub- 
jected me to such inconvenience, but did not 
offer to make room for me in the body of the 
coach, though there was room enough if the 
other had been the quiet lady she was herself. 
But she was not, and possibly this was Mrs. 
Ransom^s excuse for her apparent lack of con- 
sideration for me. Before we reached the 
point where the lane cuts in, I became aware of 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


149 


some disturbance behind me, and when we really 
got there, I heard first the coach door opening, 
then your wife^s voice, raised in entreaty to the 
driver, calling on him to stop before her sister 
jumped out and hurt herself. ^She is deaf and 
very wild^ was all the explanation she gave 
after Miss Hazen had leaped into the wet road 
and darted from sight into what looked to me, 
in the darkness, like a tangled mass of bushes. 
Then she said something about her having had 
hard work to keep her still till we got this far; 
but that she was sure she would find her way 
to the hotel, and that we mustnT bother our- 
selves about it for she wasnT going to; Anitra 
and she had run this road too many times when 
they were children. That is all I have to tell 
of my intercourse with these ladies prior to our 
appearance at the hotel. I think it right for 
me to clear the slate. Ransom. Who knows 
what we may wish to write upon it next?’’ 

A slight shiver on Ransom’s part was the 
sole answer he gave to this innuendo; then both 
settled themselves to work, the eyes of either 
flashing hither and thither from one small 
object to another, in this seemingly deserted 
room. In the momentary silence which fol- 
lowed, the even breathing of the woman in the 


150 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


adjoining room could be distinctly heard. It 
seemed to affect Mr. Ransom deeply, though 
he strove hard to maintain the business-like 
attitude he had assumed from the beginning 
of this unofficial examination. 

She has confided nothing more to you since 
your return from the river bank?^’ suggested 
the lawyer. 

No.’^ 

The word came sharply, considering Mr. 
Ransom^s usual manner. The lawyer showed 
surprise but no resentment, and turned his 
attention to the bag both had noted lying open 
on two chairs. 

Nothing equivocal here,^^ he declared, after 
a moment^s careful scrutiny of its remaining 
contents. “The only comment I should make 
in regard to what I find here is that all the 
articles are less carefully chosen than you 
would expect from one of your wife^s fondness 
for fine appointments.” 

They were collected in a hurry and possibly 
by telephone,” returned the unhappy husband, 
after a shrinking glance into the bag. ^^The 
ones she provided in anticipation of her wed- 
ding are at the hotel in New York. In the 
trunks and bags there you will find articles as 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


151 


elegant as you could wish/^ Here he turned 
to the dresser, and pointed to the various 
objects grouped upon it. 

These show that she arranged herself with 
care for her meeting with you last night. How 
did she appear at that interview? Natural 

Hardly; she was much too excited. But I 
had no suspicion of what she was cherishing in 
her mind. I thought her intentions whimsical, 
and endeavored to edge in a little advice, but 
she was in no mood to receive it. Her mind 
was too full of what she intended to do. 

“ Here^s where she ate her supper, he added, 
picking up a morsel of crust from a table set 
against the wall. And so this door was found 
fastened on this side?” he proceeded, laying 
his hand on the broken lock. 

It had to be burst open, you see.” 

“ And the window?” 

Was up. The carpet, as you can tell by look 
and feeling, is still wet with the soaking it got.” 

Mr. Harper’s air changed to one of reluctant 
conviction. 

“ The evidence seems conclusive of your 
wife having left this room and the house in the 
remarkable manner stated by Miss Hazen. 
Yet — ” 


152 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


This yet showed that he was not as thoroughly 
convinced as the first phrase would show. But 
he added nothing to it; only stood listening, 
apparently to the even breathing of the sleeper 
on the other side of this loosely hanging door. 

As he did so, his eye encountered the hot, 
dry gaze of Mr. Ransom, fixed upon him in a 
suspense too cruel to prolong, and with a sudden 
change of manner he moved from the door, 
saying significantly as he led the way out: 

“ Let us have a word or two in your own 
room. It is a principle of mine not to trust 
even the ears of the deaf with what it is desir- 
able to keep secret.’’ 

Had the glance with which he said this 
lingered a moment longer on his companion’s 
face, he would undoubtedly have been startled 
at the effect of his own words. But being at 
heart a compassionate man, or possibly under- 
standing his new client much better than that 
client supposed, he had turned quite away in 
crossing the threshold, and so missed the con- 
scious fiash which for a moment replaced the 
somber and feverish expression that had already 
aged by ten years the formerly open features 
of this deeply grieved man. 

On€iB in the hall, it was too dark to note 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


153 


further niceties of expression, and by the time 
Mr. Ransom’s room was reached, purpose and 
purpose only remained visible in either face. 

As they were crossing the threshold, the 
lawyer wheeled about and cast a quick look 
behind him. 

“ I observe,” said he, that you have a full 
and unobstructed view from here of the whole 
hall and of the two doors where our interest is 
centered. I presume you kept a strict watch on 
both last night. You let nothing escape you?” 

Nothing that one could see from this room.” 

With a thoughtful air, the lawyer swung to 
the door behind them. A^ it latched, the face 
of Mr. Ransom sharpened. He even put out a 
hand and rested it on a table standing near, as 
if to support himself in anticipation of what 
the lawyer would say now that they were 
again closeted together. 

Mr. Harper was not without his reasons for a 
corresponding agitation, but he naturally con- 
trolled himself better, and it was with almost a 
judicial air that he made this long-expected 
but long-deferred suggestion: 

'^You had better tell me now, and as ex- 
plicitly as possible, just what is in your mind. 
It will prevent all misunderstanding between 


154 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


US, as well as any injudicious move on my 
part/’ 

Mr. Ransom hesitated, leaning hard on the 
table; then, with a sudden burst, he exclaimed: 

“ It sounds like folly, and you may think 
that my troubles have driven me mad. But I 
have a feeling here — a feeling without any 
reason or proof to back it — that the woman now 
sleeping off her exhaustion in Anitra’s room is 
the woman I courted and married — Georgian 
Hazen, now Georgian Ransom, my wife.” 

^^Good! I have made no mistake. That is 
my thought, too,” responded the lawyer. 


CHAPTER XV 


ANITRA 

A FEW minutes later they were discussing 
this amazing possibility. 

I have no reason for this conclusion, — 
this hope,’’ admitted Mr. Ransom. It is 
instinct with me, an intuition, and not the 
result of my judgment. It came to me when 
she first addressed me down by the mill-stream. 
If you consider me either wrong or misled, I 
confess that I shall not be able to combat your 
decision with any argument plausible enough 
to hold your attention for a moment.” 

^^But I don’t consider you either wrong or 
misled,” protested the other. “That is,” he 
warily added, “ I am ready to accept the cor- 
rectness of the possibility you mention and 
afterwards to note where the supposition will 
lead us. Of course, your first sensation is that 
of relief.” 

“ It will be when I am no longer the prey of 
doubts.” 


156 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


“Notwithstanding the mystery?” 

“ Notwithstanding the mystery. The one 
thing I have found it impossible to contemplate 
is her death; — the extinction of all hope which 
death alone can bring. She has become so 
blended with my every thought since the hour 
she vanished from my eyes and consequently 
from my protection, that I should lose the 
better part of my self in losing her. Anything 
but that, Mr. Harper.” 

“Even possible shame?” 

“How, shame?” 

“Some reason very strong and very vital 
must underlie her conduct if what we suspect 
is true, and she has not only been willing to 
subject you and herself to a seeming separa- 
tion by death, but to burden herself with the 
additional misery of being obliged to assume 
a personality cumbered by such a drawback 
to happiness and even common social inter- 
course as this of the supposed Anitra.” 

“ You mean her deafness?” 

“ I mean that, yes. What could Mrs. Ran- 
som^s motive be (if the woman sleeping yonder 
is Mrs. Ransom) for so tremendous a sacrifice 
as this you ascribe to her? The rescue of her 
sister from some impending calamity? That 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 157 

would argue a love of long standing and of 
superhuman force; one far transcending even 
her natural affection for the husband to whom 
she has just given her hand. Such a love under 
such circumstances is not possible. She has 
known this long lost sister for a few days 
only. Her sense of duty towards her, even her 
compassion for one so unfortunate, might lead 
her to risk much, but not so much as that. You 
must look for some other explanation; one 
more reasonable and much more personal.'^ 

“Where? where? Fm all at sea; blinded, 
dazed, almost at my wits’ end. I can see no 
reason for anything she has done. I neither 
understand her nor understand myself. I ought 
to shrink from the poor creature there, sleeping 
off — I don’t know what. But I don’t. I 
feel drawn to her, instead, irresistibly drawn, 
as if my place were at her bedside to comfort 
and protect.” 

At this impulsive assertion springing from 
a depth of feeling for which the staid lawyer had 
no measure, a perplexed frown chased all the 
urbanity from his face. Some thought, not 
altogether welcome, had come to disturb him. 
He eyed Mr. Ransom closely from under his 
clouded brows. He could do this now with 


158 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


impunity, for Mr. Ransom^s glances were turned 
whither his thoughts and inclinations had 
wandered. 

I would advise you,’^ came in slow comment 
from the watchful lawyer, not to be too cer- 
tain of your conclusions till doubt becomes 
an absolute impossibility. In tinct is a good 
thing but it must never be regaided as infallible. 
It may be proved that it is your wife who has 
fled, after all. In which case it would be a 
great mistake to put any faith in this gipsy 
girl, Anitra.” 

Mr. Ransom^s face hardened; his eyes did 
not leave the direction in which they were set. 

I will remember,’^ said he. 

His companion did not appear satisfied, and 
continued emphatically : 

Whether the woman now here is Mrs. Ran- 
som or her wild and irresponsible sister, she is 
a person of dangerous will and one not to be 
lightly regarded nor carelessly dealt with. 
Pray consider this, Mr. Ransom, and do not 
allow impulse to supersede judgment. If you 
will take my advice — 

Speak.^^ 

I should treat her as if she were the woman 
she calls herself, or, at least, as if you thought 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


159 


her so. Nothing — this word he repeated as 
he noted the incredulity with which the other 
listened — would be so likely to make her be- 
tray herself as that.^’ 

Let us go back and listen again at her 
door/^ was Mr. Ransom^s emphatic but incon- 
sequent reply. 

The lawyer desisted from further advice, but 
sighed as he followed his new client into the 
hall. At the turn of the staircase they were 
stopped by the sound of wrangling voices in 
the office below. Mr. Harper heard his name 
mentioned and hastened to interfere. Assur- 
ing Mr. Ransom of his speedy return, he stepped 
down-stairs, and in a few minutes reappeared 
with a middle-aged man of characteristic ap- 
pearance, whom he introduced to Mr. Ransom 
as Mr. Goodenough. The sight of the uncouth 
head of their youthful acquaintance of the 
morning peering up after him from the foot of 
the stairs was warranty sufficient that this was 
the man who had met the strange young lady 
on the highway early that morning. 

At sight of him Mr. Ransom felt that inner 
recoil which we all experience at the prospect 
of an immediate and definite termination of a 
long brooding doubt. In another instant and 


160 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


with one word this uncultured and hitherto 
unknown man would settle for him the greatest 
question of his life. And he did not feel pre- 
pared for it. He had an impulse almost of 
flight, as if in this way he could escape a cer- 
tainty he feared. What certainty? Perhaps 
he could not have answered had he been asked. 
His mind was in a turmoil. He had feelings 
— instincts; that was all. 

The lawyer, noting his condition, undertook 
the leadership of affairs. Beckoning Mr. Good- 
enough into Mr. Ransom^s room, he softly 
closed the door upon the many inquiring ears 
about, and, assuming the manner most likely 
to encourage the unsophisticated but straight- 
forward looking man with whom he had to 
deal, quietly observed: 

We hear that you met this morning a young 
girl going towards the Ferry. There is great 
reason why we should know just how this 
young girl looks. A lady disappeared from 
here last night, and though, from a letter she 
left behind her, we have every reason to be- 
lieve that her body is somewhere in the river, 
yet we donT want to overlook the possibility 
of her having escaped alive in another direc- 
tion. Can you describe the person you saw?^^ 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


161 


Wa^al, Fm not much good at talk/^ was the 
embarrassed, almost halting reply. “ I saw 
the gal and I remember just how she looked, 
but I couldn’t put it into words to save my 
soul. She was pretty and chipper and walked 
along as if she was part of the mornin’ ; but that 
don’t tell you much, does it? Yet I don’t know 
what else to say. P’raps you could help me 
by asking questions.” 

“ We’ll see. Was she light-complexioned? 
Yellow hair, you know, and blue eyes?” 

^^No; I don’t think she was. Not what I 
call light. My Sal’s light; this gal wasn’t like 
my Sal.” 

“Dark, then, very dark, with a gipsy color 
and snapping black eyes?” 

“No, not that either. What I should call 
betweens. But more dark than light.” 

Harper flashed a glance at Ransom before 
putting his next question. 

“What did she have on her head?” 

“Bless me if I can tell! It wasn’t a sun- 
bonnet, nor was it slapped all over with rib- 
bons and flowers like my darter’s.” 

“ But she had some sort of hat on?^ 

/ Sartain. Di^ you think she was just run- 
ning to the neighbors?” 


162 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


But she wore no coat?” 

“ I don’t remember any coat.” 

“ Do you remember her frock?” 

“No, not exactly.” 

“Don’t you remember its color?” 

“ No.” 

“Wasn’t it black? the skirt of it, at least?” 

“ Black? Wa’al, I guess not. A gal of her 
age in black! No, she was as. bright as the 
flowers in my wife’s garden. Not a black 
thing on her. I should sooner think her clothes 
were red than black.” 

Harper showed his surprise. 

“ Not a black skirt?” he persisted. 

“ No, sir’ee. I haven’t much eye for flxin’s 
but I’ve eye enough to know when a gal’s 
dressed like a gal and not like some old woman.” 

Harper’s eye stole again towards Ransom. 

“Checkmate in four moves,” he muttered. 
“The person we are interested in could have 
worn no such clothing as Mr. Goodenough de- 
scribes. Yet clothing can be changed. How, 
I cannot see in this instance; but I will risk no 
mistake. The trail we followed led too surely 
in the direction of the highway for us to drop 
all inquiries because of a colored skirt and a 
hat we cannot quite account for. If the face 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


163 


is one we know (and I really believe it was), 
we can leave the other discrepancies to future 
explanation/^ And turning back to the patient 
countryman, he composedly remarked: “You 
are positive in your recollections of the young 
lady^s features. You would have no difficulty 
in recognizing her if you saw her again? 

“ Not a bit. Once I get a picter in my mind 
of a man or a woman I see it always. And I 
can see her as plain as plain the moment I stop 
to think. She was pretty, you see, and just 
a little scared to speak to a stranger. But that 
went as she saw my face, and she asked me very 
perlite if she was on the right road to the 
Ferry.’’ 

“ And you told her she was?” 

“Sartain; and how much time she had to 
get there to catch the boat.” 

“ I see. So you would know her again if 
you saw her.” 

“ I jest would.” 

The lawyer made a move towards the door 
which Mr. Ransom hastened to open. As the 
long vista of the hall disclosed itself, Mr. Harper 
turned upon the countryman with the quiet 
remark : 

“There were two ladies here, you know. 


164 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


Twins. Their likeness was remarkable. If we 
show you the remaining one who now lies asleep, 
you surely will be able to tell if she is like the 
lady you saw.’^ 

“ If she looks just like her you can bet beans 
against potatoes on that.’^ 

^^Come, then. You neednT feel any em- 
barrassment, for she^s not only sound asleep 
but so deaf she couldnT hear you if she were 
awake. You need only take one glance and 
nod your head if she looks like the other. It 
is very desirable that none of us should speak. 
The case is a mysterious one and there’s enough 
talk about it already without the women hiding 
and listening behind every shut door you see, 
adding their gossip to the rest.” 

A knowing look, a twitch at the corners of a 
good-natured mouth, and the man followed 
them down the hall, past one or two of the 
doors alluded to, till they reached the one 
against the panel of which Mr. Ransom had 
already laid his ear. 

“Still asleep,” his gesture seemed to signify; 
and with a word of caution he led the way in. 

The room was very dark. Mrs. Deo had been 
careful to draw down the shade when she put 
her strange charge to bed, and at this first 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


165 


moment of entrance it was impossible for them 
to see more than the outline of a dark head 
upon a snowy pillow. But gradually, feature 
by feature of the sleeping woman^s countenance 
became visible, and the lawyer, turning his 
acute gaze on the man from whose recognition 
he expected so much, impatiently awaited the 
nod which was to settle their doubt. 

But that nod did not come, not even after 
Mr. Ransom, astonished at the long pause, 
turned on the stranger his own haggard and 
inquiring eyes. Instead, Mr. Goodenough lifted 
a blank stare to either face beside him, and, 
shaking his head, stumbled awkwardly back 
in an endeavor to leave the room. Mr. Ran- 
som, taken wholly by surprise, uttered some 
peremptory ejaculation, but a glance from the 
lawyer quieted him, and not till they were all 
shut up again in that convenient room at the 
head of the stairs did any of the three speak. 

And not even then without an embarrassed 
pause. Both the lawyer and his unhappy 
client had a deep and, in the case of the latter, 
a heartrending disappointment to overcome, 
and the clock on the stairs ticked out several 
seconds before the lawyer ventured to remark. 

^^Miss Hazen’s face is quite new to you, I 


166 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


perceive. Evidently it was not her twin sister 
you met on the high road this morning.’’ 

Nor anything like her,” protested the man. 

different face entirely; prettier and more 
saucy. Such a gal as a man like me would be 
glad to call darter.” 

Oh, I see!” assented the lawyer. Then with 
the instinctive caution of his class, You have 
made no mistake?” 

“ Not a bit of a one,” emphasized the other. 

Sorry I can’t give the gentleman any hope, 
but if the sisters look alike, it was not this 
woman’s twin I met. I’m ready to take my 
oath on that.” 

‘^Very well. One catches at straws in a 
stress like this. Here’s a fiver to pay for your 
trouble, and another for the lad who brought 
you here. Good day. We had no sound rea- 
son for expecting any different result from our 
experiment.” 

The man bowed awkwardly and went out. 
Mr. Harper brought down his fist heavily on 
the table, and after a short interval of silence, 
during which he studiously avoided meeting his 
companion’s eye, he remarked: 

I am as much taken aback as yourself. 
For all he had to say about her gay clothing, 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


167 


I expected a different result. The girl on the 
highway was neither Mrs. Ransom nor her 
sister. We have made a confounded mistake 
and Mrs. Ransom — 

DonT say it. I^m going back to the room 
where that woman lies sleeping. I cannot yet 
believe that my heart is not shut up within its 
walls. Fm going to watch for her eyes to open. 
Their expression will tell me what I want to 
know; — the look one gives before full realiza- 
tion comes and the soul is bare without any 
thought of subterfuge.^’ 

Very well. I should probably do the same 
if I were you. Only your insight may be 
affected by prejudice. You will excuse me if 
I join you in this watch. The experiment is 
of too important a character for its results to 
depend upon the correct seeing of one pair of 
eyes.” 


CHAPTER XVI 


“love!’’ 

She lay in the abandonment of profound 
slumber, ©ne hand under her cheek, the other 
hidden by the white spread Mrs. Deo had been 
careful to draw closely about her. Both Mr. 
Harper and Mr. Ransom regretted this fact, 
for each instinctively felt that in her hands, 
if not in her sleeping face, they should be able 
to read the story of her life. If that life had 
been a hard one, such as must have befallen 
the waif, Anitra, her hands should show it. 

But her hands were covered. And so, or 
nearly so, was her face; the latter by her long 
and curling locks of whose beauty I have 
hitherto spoken. One cheek only was visible, 
and this cheek looked dark to Ransom, decidedly 
darker than Georgian’s; but realizing that the 
room itself was dark, he forbore to draw the 
attention of the lawyer to it, or even to allow 
it to affect his own judgment to the extent it 
reasonably called for. 


' THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


169 


His first scrutiny over, Mr. Harper crossed 
over to his old seat against the wall. Mr. 
Ransom remained by the bed. And thus began 
their watch. 

It was a long and solemn one; a tedious wait- 
ing. The gloom and quiet of the small room 
was so profound that both men, for all their 
suspense and absorption in the event they 
awaited, welcomed the sound of a passing 
whisper or the careful stepping of feet in the 
corridor without. 

If they turned to look they could just catch 
the outline of each other^s countenance, but 
this they did not often attempt. Their atten- 
tion was held by the silent figure on the bed, 
and so motionless was this figure in the pro- 
found slumber in which it lay enchained, and 
so motionless were they in their increasing 
suspense and expectation, that time seemed to 
have come to a standstill in this little room. 
There was one break. The lips which had 
hitherto remained mute opened in a quiet 
murmur, and Mr. Harper, watching his client, 
saw him clutch the headboard in sudden emo- 
tion before he finally rose and, with looks still 
fixed on the bed, approached him with the 
startling announcement : 


170 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


^^The word she whispered was ^ Lovell It 
must be Georgian.’’ 

Alas! the same thought struck them both. 
Was this a proof? Mr. Ransom flushed hotly 
and crept softly back to his post. 

Again time seemed to stop. Then there 
came a cautious rap on the door, followed by 
the hasty retreat of the person knocking. It 
caused Mr. Ransom to stir slightly, but did not 
affect the lawyer. Suddenly the former rose 
with every evidence of renewed agitation. 
This drew Mr. Harper from his seat. 

“What is it?” he cried, softly approaching 
the other and whispering, though after events 
proved that he might have spoken aloud with 
impunity. 

Mr. Ransom pointed to her temple from 
which her hair had just fallen away. 

“ The veining here. I have often studied it. 
I recognize its every convolution. It is 
Georgian, Georgian who lies there — ah, she’s 
stirring, waking! Let me go — ” 

He dragged himself from Mr. Harper’s de- 
taining hand, bent over the bed and murmured 
softly but with the thrilling intensity of a 
suffering, hoping heart, the name which at that 
moment meant the whole wide world to him : 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


171 


Georgian!’’ 

Would she greet this expression with recogni- 
tion and a smile? The lawyer half expected 
her to and stepped near enough to see, but the 
eyes which had opened upon the white wall in 
front of her stared on, and when they did turn, 
as they did after one halting, agonizing minute, 
it was in response to some movement made by 
Mr. Ransom and not in reply to his voice. 

This sudden and unexpected overthrow of 
his secretly cherished hopes was terrible. As 
he saw her rise on one elbow and meet his gaze 
with one which revealed the astonishment and 
resentment of a wild creature suddenly en- 
trapped, he felt, or so he afterwards declared, 
as if the viper which had hitherto clung cold 
and deathlike about his heart had suddenly 
sprung to life and stung him. It was the most 
uncanny moment of his life. 

Aghast at the effect of this upon his own mind, 
he reeled from the room, followed by the 
lawyer. As they passed down the hall they 
heard her voice raised to a scream in uncon- 
trollable shame and indignation. This was 
followed by the snap of her key in the lock. 

They had made a great mistake, or so the 
lawyer decided when they again stood face to 


172 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


face in Mr. Ransom’s room. That the latter 
made no immediate answer was no proof that 
he did not coincide in the other’s opinion. 
Indeed it was only too evident that he did, for 
his first words, when he had controlled himself 
sufficiently to speak, were these: 

“ I should have taken your advice. In future 
I will. To me she is henceforth Anitra, and I 
shall treat her as my wife’s sister. Watch if I 
fail. Anitra ! Anitra ! ’ ’ He reiterated the word 
as if he would fix it in his mind as well as accus- 
tom his lips to it. Then he wheeled about and 
faced Harper, whose eyes he doubtless felt on 
him. ^^Yet I am not so thoroughly convinced 
as to feel absolute peace here,” he admitted, 
striking his breast with irrepressible passion. 
“My good sense tells me I am a fool, but my 
heart whispers that the sweetness in her sleep- 
ing face was the sweetness which won me to 
love Georgian Hazen. That gentle sweetness! 
Did you note it?” 

“ Yes, I noted what you mention. But don’t 
let that influence you too much. The wildest 
heart has its tender moments, and her dreams 
may have been pleasant ones.” 

Mr. Ransom remembered her unconscious 
whisper and felt stunned, silenced. The lawyer 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 173 

gave no evidence of observing this, but re- 
marked quite easily and with evident sincerity: 

I am more readily affected by proof than 
you are. I am quite convinced myself, that 
our wits have been wool-gathering. There 
was no mistaking her look of outraged woman- 
hood. It was not your wife who encountered 
your look, but the deaf Anitra. Of course, 
you wonT believe me. Yet I advise you to 
do so. It would be too dreadful to find that 
this woman really is your wife.” 

Whatr^ 

“ I know what I am saying. Nothing much 
worse could happen to you. DonT you see 
where the hypothesis to which you persist in 
clinging would land you? Should the woman 
in there prove to be your wife Georgian — ” 
The lawyer stopped and, in a tone the serious- 
ness of which could not fail to impress his 
agitated hearer, added quietly, “ you remember 
what I said to you a short time ago about 
guiUJ^ 

Guilt!” 

“ No, the word was shame. But guilt better 
expresses my meaning. I repeat, should the 
woman prove to be, not the lovely but ignorant 
girl she appears, but Georgian Ransom, your 


174 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


wife, then upon her must fall the onus of Anitra's 
disappearance if not of her possible death. 
No! you must hear me out; the time has come 
for plain speaking. Your wife had her reasons 
— we do not know what they were, but they 
were no common ones — for wishing this in- 
trusive sister out of the way. Anitra, on the 
contrary, could have desired nothing so much 
as the preservation of her protector. The con- 
clusion is not an agreeable one. Let us hope 
that the question it involves will never be 
presented for any man’s consideration.” 

Mr. Ransom sank speechless into a chair. 
This last blow was an overwhelming one and 
he sank before it. 

Mr. Harper altered his tone. He had real 
commiseration for his client and had provided 
himself with an antidote to the poison he had 
just so ruthlessly administered. 

“Courage!” he cried. “I only wished you 
to see that there were worse losses to consider 
than that of your wife’s desertion, even if that 
desertion took the form of suicide. There is a 
reason which you have forgotten for acquitting 
Mrs. Ransom of such criminal intentions and 
of accepting as your sister-in-law the woman 
who calls herself Anitra. Recall Mrs. Ran- 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


175 


som’s will; the general terms of which I felt 
myself justified in confiding to you. In it 
there are no provisions made for this Anitra. 
Had Mrs. Ransom, for any inexplicable reason, 
planned an exchange of identities with her 
sorely afflicted sister, she would have been 
careful to have left that sister some portion of 
her great fortune. But she did not remember 
her with a cent. This fact is very significant 
and should give you great comfort.^^ 

“ It should, it should, in face of the other 
alternative you have suggested as possible. 
But I fear that I am past comfort. In what- 
ever light we regard this tragedy, it all means 
woe and disaster to me. I have made a mess of 
my life and I have got to face the fact like a 
man.^’ Then rising and confronting Mr. Har- 
per with passionate intensity, he called out till 
the room rang again: 

''Georgian is dead! You hear me, Georgian 
is dead!’^ 


CHAPTER XVII 


“ I DON^T HEAR^^ 

The afternoon passed without further de- 
velopments. Mr. Harper, who had his own 
imperative engagements, left on the evening 
train for New York, promising to return the 
next day in case his presence seemed indis- 
pensable to his client. 

That client^s final word to him had been an 
injunction to keep an eye on Georgian’s so- 
called brother and to report how he had been 
affected by the news from Sitford; and when, in 
the lull following the lawyer’s departure, Mr. 
Ransom sat down in his room to look his own 
position resolutely in the face, this brother and 
his possible connection with the confusing and 
unhappy incidents of this last fatal week re- 
gained that prominent place in his thoughts 
which the doubts engendered by the unusual 
character of these incidents had for a while 
dispelled. 

What had been the hold of this strange and 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


177 


uncongenial man on Georgian? And was his 
reappearance at the same time with that of a 
supposedly long deceased sister simply a coinci- 
dence so startling as to appear unreal? 

He had not seen Anitra again and did not 
propose to, unless the meeting came about in a 
natural way and without any show of desire on 
his part. If any suspicion had been awakened 
in the house by his peculiar conduct in the 
morning, he meant it to be speedily dissipated 
by the careful way in which he now held to his 
role of despairing husband whose only interest 
in the girl left on his hands was the dutiful one 
of a reluctant brother-in-law, who doubts the 
kindly feelings of his strange and unwelcome 
charge. 

The landlady, with a delicacy he highly 
appreciated, cared for the young girl without 
making her conspicuous by any undue atten- 
tion. No tidings had come in of any discovery 
in the mill-stream or in the river into which it 
ran, and there being nothing with which to 
feed gossip, the townsfolk who had gathered 
about the hotel porches gradually began to 
disperse, till only a few of the most persistent 
remained to keep up conversation till midnight. 

Finally these too left and the house sank into 


178 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


quiet, a quiet which remained unbroken all 
night; for everybody, even poor Mr. Ransom, 
slept. 

He was up, however, with the first beam 
entering his room. How could he tell but 
that news of a definite and encouraging nature 
awaited him? Some one might have come in 
early from town or river. All search had not 
been abandoned. There were certain persist- 
ent ones who had gone as far as Beardsley^s. 
Some of these might have returned. He would 
hasten down and see. But it was only to find 
the office empty, and though the household 
presently awoke and the great front door was 
thrown open to all comers, no eager straggler 
came rushing in with the tidings he equally 
longed and dreaded to receive. 

At half-past ten the representative of the 
county police called on Mr. Ransom, but with 
small result. Shortly after his departure, the 
mail came in and with it the New York papers. 
These he read with avidity. But they added 
nothing to his knowledge. Georgian’s death 
was accepted as a fact, and the peculiarities of 
their history since their unfortunate wedding- 
day were laid bare with but little consideration 
for his feelings or the good name of his bride. 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


179 


With a sorer heart than ever, he flung the 
papers from him and went out to gather strength 
in the open air. 

There was a corner of the veranda into 
which he had never ventured. It was likely 
to be a solitary one at this hour, and thither 
he now went. But a shock awaited him there. 
A lady was pacing its still damp boards. A 
lady who did not turn her head at his step, but 
whom he instantly recognized from her dress, 
and wilful but not ungraceful bearing, as her 
whom he was determined to call, nay recognize, 
as Anitra Hazen. 

His judgment counseled retreat, but the 
fascination of her presence held him, and in 
that moment of hesitation she turned towards 
him and flight became impossible. 

It was the first opportunity he had had of 
observing her features in broad daylight. The 
effect was a confused one. She was Georgian 
and she was not Georgian. Her skin was de- 
cidedly darker, her eyes more lustrous, her 
bearing less polished and at the same time 
more impassioned. She was not so tall or 
quite so elegantly proportioned; — or was it 
her rude method of dressing her hair and the 
awkward cut of her clothes which made the 


180 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


difference. He could not be sure. Resolved 
as he was to consider her Anitra, and excellent 
as his reasons were for doing so, the swelling 
of his heart as he met her eye roused again 
the old doubt and gave an unnatural tone to 
his voice as he advanced towards her with an 
impetuous utterance of her name : 

^^Anitra!^^ 

She shrunk, not at the word but at his 
movement, which undoubtedly was abrupt; 
but immediately recovered herself and, meeting 
him half-way, cried out in the unnaturally loud 
tones of the very deaf : 

^‘They don’t bring my sister back. She is 
drowned, drowned. But you still have Anitra,” 
she exclaimed in child-like triumph. “Anitra 
will be good to you. Don’t forsake the poor 
girl. She will go where you go and be very 
obedient and not get angry ever again.” 

He felt his hair rise. Something in her look, 
something in her manner of making evident 
the indefinable barrier between them even 
while expressing her desire to accompany him, 
made such a disturbance in his brain that for 
the moment he no longer knew himself, nor 
her, nor the condition of things about him. 
If she saw the effect she produced, she gave no 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 181 

evidence of it. She had begun to smile and 
her smile transformed her. The wild look 
which was never long out of her eyes softened 
into a milder gleam, and dimples he had been 
accustomed to see around lips he had kissed 
and called the sweetest in the world flashed 
for a moment in the face before him with a 
story of love he dared not read, yet found it 
impossible to forget or see unmoved. 

“ What trial is this into which my unhappy 
fate has plunged me!^^ thought he. “Can 
reason stand it? Can I see this woman daily, 
hourly, and not go mad between my doubts 
and my love?^^ 

His face had turned so stern that even she 
noticed it, and in a trice the offending dimples 
disappeared. 

“You are angry,^’ she pouted. “You donT 
want Anitra. Nod if it is so, nod and I will 
go away.” 

He did not nod; he could not. She seemed 
to gather courage at this, and though she did 
not smile again, she gave him a happy look as 
she said: 

“ I have no home now, nor any friend since 
sister has gone. I don't want any if I can stay 
with you and learn things. I want to be like 


182 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


sister. She was nice and wore pretty clothes. 
She gave me some, but I don^t know where 
they are. I don^t like this dress. It’s black 
and all bad round the bottom where I fell into 
the mud.” 

r She looked down at her dress. It showed, 
in spite of Mrs. Deo’s effort at cleaning it, 
signs of her tramp through the wet lane. He 
looked at it too, but it was mechanically. He 
was debating in his mind a formidable question. 
Should he grasp her hand, insist that she was 
Georgian and demand her confidence and the 
truth? or should he follow the lawyer’s advice 
and continue to accept appearances, meet her 
on her own ground and give her the answer 
called for by her lonely and forsaken position? 
He found after a moment’s thought that he had 
no choice; that he could not do the first and 
must do the last. 

^^You shall come with me,” said he quietly. 
^^I will see that you have every suitable pro- 
tection and care.” 

She surveyed him with the same unmoved 
inquiry burning in her eyes. 

^^I don’t hear,” said she. 

He looked at her, his lips set, his eyes as 
inquiring as her own. 


THE CALL OF THE WATERFALL 


183 


I don’t believe it/’ he muttered just above 
his breath. 

The steady stare of her eyes never faltered. 

You loved sister, love me,” she whispered. 

He fell back from her. This was not 
Georgian. This was the untutored girl about 
whom Georgian had written to him. Every- 
thing proved it, even her hands upon which his 
eyes now fell. Why had he not noticed them 
before? He had meant to look at them the 
first thing. Now that he did, he saw that he 
might have spared himself some of the miser- 
able uncertainties of the last few minutes. 
They were small and slight like Georgian’s, 
but very brown and only half cared for. That 
they were cared for at all astonished him. 
But she soon explained that. Seeing where 
his eyes were fixed, she cried out: 

Don’t look at my hands. I know they are ' 
not real nice like sister’s. But I’m learning. 
She showed me how to rub them white and cut 
the nails. A woman did it for me the first 
time and I’ve been doing it ever since, but 
they don’t look like hers, for all the pretty 
rings she bought me. Was I foolish to want 
the rings? I always had rings when I was 
with the gipsies. They were not gold ones. 


184 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


but I liked them. And Mother Duda liked 
rings too and made me one once out of beads. 
It was on my finger when my sister took me 
home with her. That is why she brought me 
these. She didnT think the bead one was 
good enough. It wasn’t much like hers.” 

Ransom recalled the diamonds and the rich 
sapphires he had been accustomed to see on 
his bride’s hand. 

But this did not engage him long. Some 
method of communication must be found with 
this girl, which could be both definite and un- 
mistakable. Feeling in his pocket, he brought 
out pencil and a small pad. He would write 
what he had to say, and was hesitating over 
the words with which to open this communica- 
tion, when he saw her hand thrust itself be- 
tween his eyes and the pad, and heard these 
words uttered in a resolute tone, but not with- 
out a hint of sadness: 

I cannot read. I have never been taught.” 


PART III 


MONEY 

CHAPTER XVIII 

GOD^S FOREST, THEN MAN’s 

The pencil and pad fell from Mr. Ransom’s 
hands. He stared at the girl who had made this 
astonishing statement, and his brain whirled. 

As for her, she simply stooped and picked 
up the pad. 

^^You feel badly about that,” said she. 

You want me to read. I’ll learn. That will 
make me more like sister. But I know some 
things now. I know what you are thinking 
about. You are curious about my life, what 
it has been and what kind of a girl I am. I’ll 
tell you. I can talk if I cannot hear. I heard 
up to two years ago. Shall I talk now? Shall 
I tell you what I told Georgian when she 
found me crying in the street and took me 
home to her house?” 

He nodded blindly. 

With a smile as beautiful as Georgian’s — 
for a moment he thought more beautiful — she 


186 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


drew him to a seat. She was all fire and pur- 
pose now. The spark of intelligence which 
was not always visible in her eye burned 
brightly. She would have looked lovely even 
to a stranger, but he was not thinking of her 
looks, only of the hopelessness of the situation, 
its difficulties and possibly its perils. 

“ I donT remember all that has happened 
to me,” she began, speaking very fast. I 
never tried to remember, when I was little; I 
just lived, and ran wild in the roads and woods 
like the weasels and the chipmunks. The 
gipsies were good to me. I had not a cross 
word in years. The wife of the king was my 
friend, and all I knew I learned from her. It 
was not much, but it helped me to live in the 
forest and be happy, as long as I was a little 
girl. When I grew up it was different. It 
was the king who was kind then, and the woman 
who was fierce. I didn’t like his kindness, but 
she didn’t know this, for after one day when she 
caught him staring at me across the fire, she 
sent me off after something she wanted in a 
small town we were camping near, and when 
I came back with it, the band was gone. I 
tried to follow, but it was dark and I didn’t 
know the way; besides I was afraid — afraid 


MONEY 


187 


of him. So I crept back to the town and slept 
in the straw of a barn I found open. Next day 
I sold my earrings and got bread. It didn^t 
last long and I tried to work, but that meant 
sleeping under a roof, and houses smothered 
me, so I did my work badly and was turned 
out. Then I sold my ring. It was my last 
trinket, and when the few cents I got for it 
were gone, I wandered about hungry. This I 
was used to and didnT/ mind at first, but at last 
I went to work again, and I did better now for 
a little while, till one evening I saw, through 
the stable window of the inn where I was work- 
ing, two black eyes staring in just as they 
stared across the dying embers of the gipsy 
camp. I did not scream, but I hid myself, and 
when they were gone away stole out and got 
on the cars, and gave the man my last dollar 
— all the money I had earned — for a ride to New 
York. I did not know any better. I knew he 
never went to New York, and I thought I 
would be safe from him there. But of the 
difference between the woods and a forest of 
brick and stone I never thought; of night with 
no shelter but the wall of some blind alley; of 
hunger in the sight of food, and wild beasts 
in the shape of men. I didnT know where to 


188 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


go or who to speak to. If any one stared at me 
long, I turned and ran away. I ran away once 
from a policeman. He thought me a thief, 
and started to run after me. But people 
slipped in between us and I got away. What 
happened next I don^t know. Perhaps I was 
thrown down, perhaps I fell. I had come a 
long way and I was tired. When I did know 
anything, I was lying on my back in a narrow 
street, looking up at a tall building that seemed 
to go right up into the sky like the great rocks 
I had sometimes slept under when I was with 
the gipsies. Only there were windows in the 
rock, out of which looked faces, and I got 
looking back at one of these faces and the face 
looked at me, and I liked it and got up on my 
knees and held up my arms, and the face drew 
back out of sight, and I felt very sorry and 
cried and almost laid down again. I seemed 
so alone and hurt and hungry. But the chil- 
dren — there were crowds of children — 
wouldn’t let me. They got in a ring and pulled 
at me, and some one cried : ^ Big cheeks is com- 
ing! Big cheeks will eat her up,’ and I was 
angry and got up on my feet. But I couldn’t 
walk; I screamed when I tried to, which fright- 
ened the children, and they all ran away. 


MONEY 


189 


But I didn^t fall; an arm was round me, a good, 
kind arm, and though I didn^t see the face of 
the woman who helped, for she had her head 
wrapped up in an old shawl, I felt that it was 
the same which had looked out of the window 
at me, and went willingly enough when she 
began to draw me toward the house and up 
the first flight of stairs, though I could hardly 
help screaming every time my foot touched 
the ground. At the top of the first flight I 
stopped; I could go no further. The woman 
heard me pant, and pushing the covering from 
her eyes, she turned my face towards the light 
and looked at it. I thought she wanted to see 
if I was strong enough to go on, but that wasnT 
it at all, for in a minute I heard her say, in a 
voice so sweet I thought I had never heard the 
like, ^Yes, youTe pretty; I want a pretty girl 
to stay with me and go about selling my things. 
I love pretty girls; I never was pretty myself. 
Will you stay with me if I take you up to my 
room and take care of you? Fll be good to 
you, little duckling, everybody about here will 
tell you that; everybody but the children, they 
donT like me.^ I moaned, but it was from 
happiness. It seemed too good to hear that 
cooing voice in my ear. I thought of my 


190 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


mother — a dream — and my arms went up as 
they had in the street below. ^ I will stay/ I 
said. She caught my hands and that is all I 
remember till I found myself in bed, with my 
ankle bound up and a gentle hand smoothing 
my hair. It was a month before I walked 
again. All the time this woman tended me, 
but always from behind. I did not see her 
face — not well — only by glimpses and then 
only partly, for the shawl was always over her 
head, covering everything but her eyes and 
mouth. These were small, the smallest I ever 
saw, little pig eyes, and little screwed up 
mouth; but the look of them was kindly and 
that was all I cared about then; that and her 
talk, which made me cry one minute and laugh 
the next. I have never cried so much or 
laughed so much in my life as I did that one 
month. She told such sad things and she told 
such funny ones. She made me glad to see her 
come in and sorry to see her go out. She let 
no one else come near me. I did not care; I 
liked her too well. I was never tired of listen- 
ing to her praises and she praised me a great 
deal. I even did not mind sleeping under a 
roof as much as I had before, perhaps because 
we were so near it; perhaps because the room 


MONEY 


191 


was so full of all sorts of things, I never got 
tired of looking at them. Pretty things she 
called them, but when I saw more things, 
things outside in shop windows and the houses 
I afterwards went into, I knew they were very 
cheap things and not always pretty. But she 
thought they were, and used to talk about them 
by the hour and tell me stories she had made 
up about the pictures she had cut out of news- 
papers. And I learned something; I could not 
help it, and even began to think a bit — some- 
thing I had never done before. But when I 
got on my feet again, and was given the choice 
of staying there all the time, I did not know at 
first whether I wanted to or not. For Mother 
Duda had been very honest with me, and the 
minute she found that I could walk again had 
told me that I would have to have great pa- 
tience if I lived with her, and endure a very 
disagreeable sight. Then she pulled off her 
shawl and I saw her as she was and almost 
screamed, she looked so horrid to me, but I 
didn’t quite, for her eyes wouldn’t let me. 
They seemed to ask me not to care, but to love 
her a little though she was a fright to look at, 
and I tried but I couldn’t, I could only keep 
from screaming. 


192 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


She had a goitre; that is what she called it, 
and the great pocket of flesh hanging down 
on either side of her neck frightened me. It 
frightened everybody; she was used to that, 
but she said she loved me and felt my fear 
more than she did others. Could I bear to 
live with her, knowing what her shawl hid? 
If I could she would be good to me, but if I 
couldn^t she would do what she could to get 
me honest work in some other place. I didn’t 
answer at first, but I did before she had put 
her shawl on again. I told her that I would 
forget everything but her good smile, and stay 
with her a little while. I stayed three years, 
helping her by going about and selling the 
tatting work she made. 

She could make beautiful patterns and so 
neat, but she couldn’t sell them, on account 
of her awful appearance. So I was very useful 
to her, and felt I was earning my meat and 
drink and the kind looks and words which 
made them taste good. It taught me a lot, 
going around. I saw people and how they 
lived and what was nice and what wasn’t. I 
was only sorry that Mother Duda couldn’t go 
too. She loved pretty things so. But she 
never went out except at a very early hour in 


MONEY 


193 


the morning, so early that it was still dark. 
It seemed a terrible hour to me, but she always 
came in with a smile, and when one day I asked 
her why, she said, because she saw so many 
other poor creatures out at this same hour, 
who were worse to look at than she was. This 
didnT seem possible to me, and once I went out 
with her to see. But I never went again. 
Such faces as we met; such deformity — men 
who never showed themselves by day — women 
who loved beauty and were hideous. We saw 
them on street corners — coming up cellar 
steps, slinking in and out of blind alleys — 
never where it was light — and they shrank 
from each other, but not from the policeman. 
They were not afraid of his eye; they were used 
to him and he to them. After I had passed a 
dozen such miserable creatures, I felt myself 
one of them and never wanted to go out at 
this hour again. 

^^DonT you believe this part of my story,’’ 
she suddenly asked, looking up into Mr. Ran- 
som’s troubled face? Ask the policeman who 
tramps about those streets every night; he’ll 
tell you.” 

The question on Ransom’s lips died. What 
use of asking what she could not hear. 


194 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


“ I wish I knew what you were thinking/^ 
she now murmured softly, so softly that he 
hardly caught the words. “ But I never shall, 
I never shall. I will tell you now how I be- 
came deaf,’’ she promised after a moment of 
wistful gazing. Is there any one near? Can 
anybody hear me?” she continued, with a sus- 
picious look about her. 

He shook his head. It was the first move- 
ment he had made since she began her story. 

This apparently reassured her, for she pro- 
ceeded at once to say: 

Mother Duda had never told me anything 
about herself. It scared me then when one 
morning I found sitting at the breakfast table 
a man who she said was her son. He was big 
and pale looking, and had a slight swelling on 
one side of his neck which made me sick; but 
I tried to be polite, though I did not like him 
at all and had a sudden feeling of having no 
home any more. That was the first day. The 
next two were worse. For he didn’t hate me 
as I did him, and wouldn’t leave the house 
while I was there, saying he could not bear to 
be away from his mother. But he skipped 
out quick enough after I was gone, so the 
neighbors said, and sometimes I think he fol- 


MONEY 


195 


lowed me. Mother Duda wasn't like her old 
self at all. She loved him, he was her son, but 
she didn't like all he did. She wanted him to 
work; he wouldn't work. He sat and stared 
at me as the gipsy king used to stare, and if I 
grew red and hot it was from shame and fear 
and horror of the great throat I saw growing 
from day to day, and which would some time 
be like his mother's. He knew I didn't like 
him, but he wasn't good like Mother Duda, 
and told me one day that he was going to make 
me his wife, whether I wanted him to or not, 
and talked about a great secret, and the big 
man he would be some day. This made me 
angry, and I said that all the bigness he would 
ever have would be in his neck. At which he 
struck me, right across the ear, hard, so hard 
that I fell on the floor with a scream, and 
Mother Duda came running. He was sorry 
then and threw down the thing he had in his 
hand; but the harm had been done and I was 
sick a month and had doctors and awful pain, 
and when I was well again I couldn't hear a 
sound with that ear. Hans wasn't there while 
I was ill; I shouldn't have got well if he had been; 
but he came back when I was up again and was 
very meek though he didn't stop looking at me. 


196 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


I thought I would run away one day, and went 
out without my basket, but after I had tried 
two whole days to get work and couldn^t, I 
went back. Mother Duda almost squeezed 
the heart out of me for joy, and Hans went 
down on his knees and promised not to do or 
say anything more that I didn^t like. He even 
promised to go to work, but his work was of a 
queer kind. It kept him in his little room 
and meant spending money, and not getting it. 
Men came to see him and were locked up with 
him in his little room. And if he went out, 
he locked the door and took the key away, 
and said great times were coming and that I 
would be glad to marry him some day, whether 
his neck was big or small. But I knew I 
shouldn't and kept very close to Mother Duda 
and begged her to get me a new home, and she 
promised and I was feeling happier, when one 
day Hans was called out by a man and went 
away so fast that he forgot to lock his door, 
and Mother Duda and I went into the room, 
and it was then that the thing happened which 
spoiled all my life. I don't understand it. 
I never did, for no one could tell me any- 
thing after that day. Mother Duda had gone 
up to a table and was moving things about. 


MONEY 


197 


trying to see what they were, when everything 
turned black, the room shook, and I was whirl- 
ing all about, trying to take hold of things 
which seemed to be falling about me, till I too 
fell. When I knew anything, there was lots 
of people looking at me; people of the house, 
men, women, and children, but what was 
strangest of all was the awful stillness. No 
one made any sound — nothing made any 
sound, though I saw an old book-shelf tumble 
down from the wall while I was looking, and 
people moved about and opened their lips and 
seemed to be talking. Had Hans struck me 
again? I began to think so, and got up from 
the floor where I was lying and tried to call 
out, but my voice made no noise though people 
looked around as if it had, and I felt an awful 
fright, not only for myself but for Mother 
Duda, who was being carried out of the door 
by two men, and who did not move at all 
and who never moved again. Poor Mother 
Duda, she was killed and I was deaf. I knew 
it after a little while, but I don’t know 
what did it; something that Hans had; some- 
thing that Mother Duda touched — a square 
something — I had just caught a glimpse 
of it in Mother Duda’s hand when the room 


198 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


flew into a wreck and I became what I am 
now.” 

“Dynamite,” murmured Ransom; then 
paused and had a small struggle with his heart, 
for she was looking up into his face, demanding 
sympathy with Georgian’s eyes; and being 
close together on the short seat, he could not 
help but feel her shudders and share the in- 
tense excitement which choked her. 

“ Oh,” she cried, as he laid his hand a moment 
on her arm and then took it away again, 
“ one minute to hear! the next to find the world 
all still, always still, — a poor girl — not know- 
ing how to read or write! But you cannot care 
about that; you cannot care about me. It’s 
sister you want to hear about, how she came to 
find me; how we came here for new and terrible 
things to happen; always for new and terrible 
things to happen which I don’t understand. 

“ Hans never came back. All sorts of police- 
men came into the house, doctors came, priests 
came, but no Hans. Mother Duda was buried, 
I rode in a coach at the funeral, but still no 
Hans. The old life was over, and when the food 
was all gone from the shelves, I took my little 
basket and went out, not meaning to come 
back again. And I did not. I sold my bas- 


MONEY 


199 


ket out; got a handful of pennies and went 
to the market to get something to eat. Then 
I went into a park, where there were benches, 
and sat down to rest. I did not know of any 
place to go to and began to cry, when a lady 
stopped before me, and I looked up and saw 
myself. 

thought I was dreaming or had the fever 
again, as when I was sick with my ear, and I 
thought it was myself as I would look in heaven, 
for she had such beautiful clothes on and looked 
so happy. But when she talked, I could see 
her lips move and I couldnT hear; and I knew 
that I was just in the park with my empty 
basket and my onion and bread, and that the 
lady was a lady and no one I knew, only so 
like what I had seen of myself in the glass 
that I was shaking all over, and she was shak- 
ing all over, and neither of us could look away. 
And still her lips moved, and seeing her at last 
look frightened and angry that I didnT answer, 
I spoke and said that I was deaf; that I was 
very sorry that I couldnT hear because we 
looked so much alike, though she was a great 
lady and I was a very, very poor girl who 
hadnT any home or any friends, or anything to 
wear or eat but what she saw. At this her 


200 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


eyes grew bigger even than before, and she 
tried to talk some more, and when I shook my 
head she took hold of my arm and began 
drawing me away, and I went and we got on 
the cars, and she took me to a house and into a 
room where she took away my basket and put 
me in a chair, and took off first her hat, then 
my own, and showed me the two heads in a 
glass, and then looked at me so hard that I 
cried out, ^ Sister,^ which made her jump up 
and put her hand on her heart, then look at me 
again harder and harder, till I remembered 
way back in my life, and I said : 

^^^When I was a little girl I had a sister they 
called my twin. That was before I lived in 
the woods with the gipsies. Are you that sister 
grown up? The place where we played together 
had a tall fence with points at the top. There 
were flowers and there were bushes with cur- 
rants on them all round the fence.’ 

“ She made a sudden move, and I felt her 
arms about my neck. I think she cried a 
little. I didn’t, I was too glad. I knew she 
was that sister the moment our faces touched, 
and I knew she would care for me, and that I 
needn’t go back into the streets any more. So 
I kissed her and talked a good deal and told 


MONEY 


201 


her what Fve been telling, and she tried to 
answer, tried as you did to write, but all I 
could understand was that she meant to keep 
me, but not in the place where we were, and 
that I was to go out again. But she fixed me 
up a little before we went out, and she bought 
me some things, so that I looked different. 
Then we went into another house, where she 
talked with a woman for a long time, and then 
sat down with me and moved her lips very 
patiently, motioning me to watch and try to 
understand. But I was frightened and couldnT. 
So she gave up and, kissing me, made motions 
with her hands which I understood better; 
she wanted me to stay there while she went 
away, and I promised to if she would come 
back soon. At this she took out her watch. 
I was pleased with the watch, and she let me 
look at it, and inside against the cover I saw 
a picture. You know whose it was.^^ 

The depths to which her voice sank, the 
trembling of her tones, startled Ransom. Had 
she been less unfortunate, he would have 
moved to a different seat, but he could not 
show her a discourtesy after so pitiful a tale. 
But the nod he gave her was a grave one, and 
her cheek flushed and her head fell, as she 


202 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


softly added : It was the first time I ever saw 
a face I liked — you won't mind my saying so, 
— and I wanted to keep the watch, but sister 
carried it away. She didn't tell me what it 
meant, her having your picture where she could 
see it all the time, but when she came again 
she made me know that you and she were mar- 
ried, by pointing at the picture and then 
throwing something white over her head; I 
didn't ask for the watch after that, but — " 

A far-away look, a trembling of her whole 
body, finished this ingenuous confession. Ran- 
som edged himself away and then was sorry 
for it, for her lip quivered and her hands, from 
being quiet, began that nervous interlacing of 
the fingers which bespeaks mental perturba- 
tion. 

am very ignorant," she faltered; “per- 
haps I have said something wrong. I don't 
mean to, I want to be a good girl and please 
you, so that you won't send me away now sister 
is gone. Ah, I know what you want," she 
suddenly broke out, as he seized her by the 
arm and looked inquiringly at her. “ You 
want me to tell why I jumped out of the car- 
riage that night and vexed Georgian and was 
naughty and wouldn't speak to her. I can't, 


MONEY 


203 


I can^t. You .wouldn^t like it if I did. But 
Fin sorry now, and will never vex you, but do 
just what you want me to. Shall I go up- 
stairs now?’^ 

He shook his head. How could he let her 
go with so much unsaid? She had talked 
frankly till she had reached the very place 
where his greatest interest lay. Then she had 
suddenly shown shyness of her subject and 
leaped the gap, as it were, to the present 
moment. How recall her to the hour when she 
had seen Georgian for the second time? How 
urge her into a description of those days suc- 
ceeding his wife^s flight from the hotel, of 
which he had no account, save the feverish lines 
of the letter she had sent him. He was rack- 
ing his brain for some method of communicat- 
ing his wishes to Anitra, when he heard steps 
behind him, and, tmning, saw the clerk ap- 
proaching him with a telegram. 

He glanced at her slyly as he took it. Some- 
how he couldnT get used to her deafness, and 
expected her to give some evidence of surprise 
or curiosity. But she was still studying her 
hands, and as his eyes lingered on her down- 
cast face he saw a tear well from her lids and 
wet the cheek she held partly turned from him. 


204 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


He wanted to kiss that tear, but refrained and 
opened his telegram instead. It was from Mr. 
Harper, and ran thus: 

Expect a visitor. The man we know has 
left the St. Denis. 


CHAPTER XIX 


IN MRS. DEO^S ROOM 

A PREY to fresh agitation, he stepped back 
to Anitra^s side. Surely she must understand 
that it was Georgian and not herself about 
whom he was most anxious to hear. But she 
did not seem to. The smile with which she 
greeted him suggested nothing of the past. It 
spoke only of the future. 

“ I will learn to be like sister,’’ she impul- 
sively cried out, rising and beaming brightly 
upon him. I will forget the old gipsy ways 
and Mother Duda’s ways, and try to be nice and 
pretty like my sister. And you shall learn me 
to read and write. I’ve known deaf people 
who learned. Then I shall know what you 
think; now I only know how you feel.” 

He shook his head, a little sadly, perhaps. 
There were people who could teach her these 
arts, but not he. He had neither the ability, 
the courage, nor the patience. 

Then some one shall learn me,” she loudly 
insisted, her cheek flushing and her eye showing 


206 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


an angry spark. I will not be ignorant al- 
ways; I will not, I will not.^^ And turning, 
she fled from his side, and he was left to think 
over her story and ask himself for the hundredth 
time what it all meant, what his own sensations 
meant, and what would be the outcome of con- 
ditions so complicated. 

The possibly speedy appearance on the scene 
of Georgian's so-called brother did not detract 
from his difficulty. He felt helpless without 
the support of Mr. Harper’s presence, and spent 
a very troubled forenoon listening to the 
mingled condolences and advice of people who 
had no interest in his concerns save such as 
sprang from curiosity and a morbid craving 
for excitement. 

At two o’clock occurred the event of which 
he had been forewarned. A carriage drove 
up to the hotel and from it stepped two trav- 
elers; one of them a stranger, the other the 
man with the twisted jaw. Mr. Ransom ad- 
vanced to meet the latter. He was anxious to 
listen to his first inquiries and, if possible, be 
the person to answer them. 

He was successful in this. Mr. Hazen no 
sooner saw him than he accosted him without 
ceremony. 


MONEY 


207 


What is this I hear and read about Georgian 
and her so-called twin?” he cried. “Nothing 
that I can believe, I want you to know. 
Georgian may have drowned herself. That is 
credible enough. But that the girl we read 
about in the papers and whom she evidently 
induced to come to this place with her should 
be the dead girl we called Anitra — why, that 
is all bosh — a tale to deceive the public, and 
possibly you, but not one to deceive me. The 
co-incidence is much too improbable.” 

“ ‘ There are stranger things in heaven and 
earth’” — quoted Ransom; but Hazen was 
already in conversation with the group of hotel 
idlers who had crowded up at sound of his 
loud voice. 

After a careful look which had taken in all 
of their faces, he had approached one young 
fellow, covering the lower part of his face as he 
did so. 

“ Halloo! Yates,” he called out. “ Don’t you 
remember the day we tied two chickens to- 
gether, leg to leg, and sent them tumbling 
down the hill back of old Wylie’s barn?” 

“Alf Hazen!” shouted the fellow, thus ac- 
costed. “ Why, I thought you — ” 

“Dead, eh? Of course you did. So did 


208 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


everybody else. But IVe come to life, you see. 
With sad marks of battle on me,” he continued, 
dropping his hand. ''You all recognize me?” 

" Yes, yes,” rose in one acclaim from a dozen 
or more throats after a moment of awkward 
uncertainty. 

" I know the eyes,” vigorously asserted one. 

"And the voice,” chimed in another. After 
which rose a confused babel of ejaculations and 
exclamatory questions, among which one could 
detect : 

" How did it happen, Alf ?” What took off 
your jaw?” and other equally felicitous ex- 
pressions. 

" ril tell you all about that later,” he replied, 
after silence had in a measure been restored. 
"What I want to say now is this. Is it be- 
lievable that simultaneously with my own 
return from the grave another member of my 
family should reappear before you from an 
older and much more certain burying? I tell 
you no. The riddle is one which calls for quite 
another solution and I have come to assist you 
in finding it.” 

Here he cast a sinister glance at Ransom. 

The latter met the implied accusation with 
singular calmness. 


MONEY 


209 


^^Any assistance will be welcome/^ said he, 
“ which will enable us to solve this very serious 
problem.” Then, as Hazen^s lip curled, he 
added with dignified candor, “ I scorn to re- 
tort by throwing any doubt on your assertion 
of relationship to my lost wife, or the possi- 
bility of these good people being misled by 
your confident bearing and a possible likeness 
about the eyes to the boy they knew. But one 
question I will hazard, and that before we have 
gone a step further. Why does it seem so 
credible to you that Georgian, a much loved 
and loving woman, should have leaped to a 
watery death within a week of her marriage? 
You have just stated that you found no dif- 
ficulty in that. Does not that statement call 
for some explanation? All your old friends 
here must see that this is my due as well as 
hers.” . 

For an instant the man hesitated, but in that 
instant his hand slipped from his mouth over 
which he had again laid it, and his whole face, 
with its changed lines and the threatening, 
almost cruel expression which these gave it, 
appeared in all its combined eagerness and 
force. A murmur escaped the watchful group 
about him, but this affected him little. His 


210 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


eyes, which he had fixed on Ransom, sharpened 
a trifie, perhaps, and his tone grew a thought 
more sarcastic as he finally retorted : 

“ I will explain myself to you but not to this 
crowd. And not to you till I am sure of the 
facts which as yet have reached me only through 
the newspapers. Let me hear a full account 
of what has transpired here since you all came 
to town. I have an enormous interest in the 
matter; — a family interest, as you are well 
aware for all your badly hidden insinuations.’^ 

“Follow me,” was the quiet reply. “There 
is a room on this very fioor where we can talk 
undisturbed.” 

Mr. Hazen cast a quick glance behind him 
at the man who had driven up with him and 
whom nobody had noticed till now. Then 
without a word he separated himself from the 
chattering group encircling him and stepped 
after Mr. Ransom into the small room where 
the latter had held his first memorable con- 
versation with the lawyer. 

“ Now,” said he as the door swung to behind 
them, “ plain language and not too much of it. 
I have no time to waste, but the truth about 
Georgian I must know.” 

Ransom settled himself. He felt bound to 


MONEY 


211 


comply with the other^s request, but he wished 
to make sure of not saying too much, or too 
little. Hazen’s attack had startled him. It 
revealed one of two things. Either this man 
of mystery had assumed the offensive to hide 
his own connection with this tragedy, or his 
antagonism was an honest one, springing from 
an utter disbelief in the circumstances reported 
to him by the press and such gossips as he had 
encountered on his way to Sitford. 

With the first possibility he felt himself un- 
able to cope without the aid of Mr. Harper; 
the second might be met with candor. Should 
he then be candid with this doubter, relate to 
him the facts as they had unrolled themselves 
before his own eyes; — secret facts — convin- 
cing ones — facts which must prove to him that 
whether Georgian did or did not lie at the 
bottom of the mill-stream, the woman now in 
the house was his sister Anitra, lost to him and 
the rest of the family for many years, but now 
found again and restored to her position as a 
Hazen and Georgian's twin. The discovery 
might not prove welcome. It would have a 
tendency to throw Mr. Hazen^s own claim into 
the disrepute he would cast on hers. But this 
consideration could have no weight with Mr. 


212 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


Ransom. He decided upon candor at all costs. 
It suited his nature best, and it also suited the 
strange and doubtful situation. Mr. Harper 
might have concluded differently, but Mr. 
Harper was not there to give advice; and the 
matter would not wait. Little as he under- 
stood this Hazen, he recognized that he was 
not a man to trifle with. Something would 
have to be said or done. 

Meeting the latter^s eye frankly, he re- 
marked : 

I have no wish to keep anything back from 
you. I am as much struck as you are by the 
mystery of this whole occurrence. I was as 
hard to convince. This is my story. It in- 
volves all that is known here with the excep- 
tion of such facts as have been kept from us 
by the three parties directly concerned — of 
which three I consider you one.’^ 

As the last four words fell from his lips he 
looked for some change, slight and hardly 
perceptible perhaps, in the other^s expression. 
But he was doomed to disappointment. The 
steady regard held, nothing moved about the 
man, not even the hand into which the poor 
disfigured chin had fallen. Ransom suppressed 
a sigh. His task was likely to prove a blind 


MONEY 


213 


one. He had a sense of stumbling in the dark, 
but the gaze he had hoped to see falter com- 
pelled him to proceed, and he told his story 
without subterfuge or suppression. 

One thing, and only one thing, caused a 
movement in the set figure before him. When 
he mentioned the will which Georgian had 
made a few hours prior to her disappearance, 
Hazen’s hand slipped aside from the wound it 
had sought to cover, and Ransom caught sight 
of the sudden throb which deepened its hue. 
It was the one infallible sign that the man was 
not wholly without feeling, and it had sprung 
to life at an intimation involving money. 

When his tale was quite finished, he rose. 
So did Hazen. 

“ Let us see this girl,’^ suggested the latter. 

It was the first word he had spoken since 
Ransom began his story. 

She is up-stairs. I will go see — ’’ 

“No, we will go see. I particularly desire 
to take her unawares.’’ 

Ransom offered no objection. Perhaps he 
felt interested in the experiment himself. To- 
gether they left the room, together they went 
up-stairs. A turmoil of questions followed them 
from the throng of men and boys gathered in 


214 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


the halls, but they returned no answer and 
curiosity remained unsatisfied. 

Once in the hall above, Ransom stopped a 
moment to deliberate. He could not enter 
Anitra’s room unannounced, and he could not 
make her hear by knocking. He must find the 
landlady. 

He knew Mrs. Deo’s room. He had had 
more than one occasion to visit it during the 
last two days. With a word of explanation 
to Hazen, he passed down the hall and tapped 
on the last door at the extreme left. No one 
answered, but the door standing ajar, he pushed 
it quietly open, being anxious to make sure 
that Mrs. Deo was not there. 

The next moment he was beckoning to 
Hazen. 

Look!’’ said he, holding the door open with 
one hand and pointing with the other to a 
young girl sitting on a low stool by the window, 
mending, or trying to mend, a rent in her 
skirt. 

^^Why, that’s Georgian!” exclaimed Hazen, 
and hastily entering he approached the anx- 
ious figure laboriously pushing her needle in 
and out of the torn goods, and pricking herself 
more than once in the attempt. 


MONEY 


215 


“Georgian!’’ he cried again and yet more 
emphatically, as he stepped up in front of her. 

The young girl failed to notice. Awkwardly 
drawing her thread out to its extreme length, 
she prepared to insert her needle again, when 
her eye caught sight of his figure bending over 
her, and she looked up quietly and with an air 
of displeasure, which pleased Ransom, — he 
could hardly tell why. This was before her 
eyes reached his face; when they had, it was 
touching to see how she tried to hide the shock 
caused by its deformity, as she said with a 
slight gesture of dismissal: 

“ I’m quite deaf. I cannot hear what you 
say. If it is the landlady you want, she has 
gone down-stairs for a minute; perhaps, to the 
kitchen.” 

He did not retreat, if anything he approached 
nearer, and Ransom was surprised to observe 
the force and persuasive power of his expres- 
sion as he repeated: 

“No nonsense, Georgian,” opening and shut- 
ting his hands as he spoke, in curious gesticula- 
tions which her eye mechanically followed but 
which seemed to convey no meaning to her, 
though he evidently expected them to and 
looked surprised (Ransom almost thought 


216 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


baffled) when she shook her head and in a 
sweet, impassive way reiterated: 

“ I cannot hear and I do not understand the 
deaf and dumb alphabet. Fm sorry, but you’ll 
have to go to some one else. Fm very unfor- 
tunate. I have to mend this dress and I don’t 
know how.” 

Hazen, who could hardly tear his eyes from 
her face, fell slowly back as she painfully and 
conscientiously returned to her task. “Good 
God!” he murmured, as his eye sought Ran- 
som’s. “What a likeness!” Then he looked 
again at the girl, at the wave of her raven 
black hair breaking into little curls just above 
her ear; at the smooth forehead rendered so 
distinguished by the fine penciling of her 
arching brows; at the delicate nose with nostrils 
all alive to the beating of an over-anxious 
heart; at the mouth, touching in its melancholy 
so far beyond her years; and lastly at the strong 
young figure huddled on the little stool; and 
bending forward again, he uttered two or three 
quick sentences which Ransom could not catch. 

His persistence, or the near approach of his 
face to hers, angered her. Rising quickly to 
her feet, she vehemently cried out: 

“ Go away from here. It is not right to keep 


MONEY 


217 


on talking to a deaf girl after she has told you 
she cannot hear you.” Then catching sight of 
Ransom, who had advanced a step in his sym- 
pathy for her, she gave a little sigh of relief 
and added querulously : 

Make this man go away. This is the land- 
lady’s room. I don’t like to have strangers 
talk to me. Besides — ” here her voice fell, 
but not so low as to be inaudible to the subject 
of her remark, ^^he’s not pretty. I’ve seen 
enough of men and women who are — ” 

At this point Ransom drew Hazen out into 
the hall. 

“What do you think now?” he demanded. 

Hazen did not reply. The room they had 
just left seemed to possess a strange fascination 
for him. He continued to look back at it as 
he preceded Ransom down the hall. Ransom 
did not press his questions, but when they were 
on the point of separating at the head of the 
stairs, he held Hazen back with the words : 

“ Let us come to some understanding. 
Neither of us can desire to waste strength in 
wrong conclusions. Can that woman be other 
than your own sister?” 

“No.” The denial was absolute. “She is 
my sister.” 


218 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


“ Anitra?^’ emphasized Ransom. 

The smile which he received in reply was 
strangely mirthless. 

I never rush to conclusions/^ was Hazen’s 
remark after a moment of possibly mutual 
heart-beat and unsettling suspense. ^^Ask me 
that same question to-morrow. Perhaps by 
then I shall be able to answer you.’' 


CHAPTER XX 

BETWEEN THE ELDERBERRY BUSHES 

No.^’ 

The word came from Ransom. He had 
reached the end of his patience and was deter- 
mined to have it out with this man on the spot. 

Come into my room,” said he. If you 
doubt her, you doubt me; and in the present 
stress of my affairs this demands an immediate 
explanation.” 

“ I have no time to enter your room, and I 
cannot linger here any longer talking on a sub- 
ject which at the present moment Is not clear 
to either of us,” was the resolute if not quite 
affable reply. Later, when my conclusions 
are made, I will see you again. Now I am 
going to eat and refresh myself. Don^t follow 
me; it will do you no good.’^ 

He turned to descend. Ransom had an 
impulse to seize him by his twisted throat and 
drag from him the secret which his impassive 
features refused to give up. But Ransom was 


220 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


no fool and, stepping back out of the way of 
temptation, he allowed him to escape without 
further parley. 

Then he went to his room. But, after an 
hour or two spent with his own thoughts, his 
restlessness became so great that he sought 
the gossips below for relief. He found them 
all clustered about Hazen, who was reeling off 
stories by the mile. This was unendurable to 
him and he was striding off, when Hazen burst 
away from his listeners and, joining Ransom, 
whispered in his ear : 

“ I saw her go by the window just now on her 
way up-street. What can she find there to 
interest her? Where is she going?^’ 

“I donT know. She doesnT consult me as 
to her movements. Probably she has gone 
for a walk. She looks as if she needs it.’^ 

^^So do you,^’ was the unexpected retort 
given by Hazen, as he stepped back to rejoin 
his associates. 

Ransom paused, watching him askance in 
doubt of the suggestion, in doubt of the man, 
in doubt of himself. Then he yielded to an 
impulse stronger than any doubt and slipped 
out into the highway, where he turned, as she 
had turned, up-street. 


MONEY 


221 


But not without a struggle. He hated him- 
self for his puppet-like acceptance of the hint 
given him by a man he both distrusted and 
disliked. He felt his dignity impaired and his 
self-confidence shaken, yet he went on, follow- 
ing the high road eagerly and watching with 
wary eye for the first glimpse of the slight 
figure which was beginning to make every 
scene alive to him. 

It had rained heavily and persistently the 
last time he came this way, but to-day the sun 
was shining with a full radiance, and the trees 
stretching away on either side of the road were 
green with the tender tracery of early leafage; 
a joy-compelling sightwhich may have accounted 
for the elasticity of his step as he ascended one 
small hill after another in the wake of a fluttering 
skirt. 

It was the cemetery road, and odd as the 
fancy was, he felt that he should overtake her 
at the old gate, behind which lay so many of 
her name. Here he had seen her name before 
its erasement from the family monument, and 
here he should see — could he say Anitra if 
he found her bending over those graves; the 
woman who could not hear, who could not 
read, — whose childish memory, if she had any 


222 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


in connection with this spot, could not be dis- 
tinct enough or sufficiently intelligent to guide 
her to this one plot? No. Human credulity 
can go far, but not so far as that. He knew 
that all his old doubts would return if, on 
entering the cemetery, he found her under the 
brown shaft carved with the name of Hazen. 

The test was one he had not sought and did 
not welcome. Yet he felt bound, now that he 
recognized it as such, to see it through and 
accept its teaching for what it surely would be 
worth. Only he began to move with more 
precaution and studied more to hide his ap- 
proach than to give any warning of it. 

The close ranks of the elderberry bushes 
lining the fences on the final hill-top lent 
themselves to the concealment he now sought. 
As soon as he was sure of her having left the 
road he drew up close to these bushes and 
walked under them till he was almost at the 
gate. Then he allowed himself to peer through 
their close branches and received an unex- 
pected shock at seeing her figure standing very 
near him, posed in an uncertainty which, for 
some reason, he had not expected, but which 
restored him to himself, though why he had not 
the courage, the time, nor the inclination to ask. 


MONEY 


223 


She was babbling in a low tone to herself, 
an open sesame to her mind, which Ransom 
hailed with a sense of awe. If only he might 
distinguish the words! But this was difficult; 
not only was her head turned partly away, but 
she spoke in a murmur which was far from 
distinct. Yet — yes, that one sentence was 
plain enough. She had muttered musingly, 
anxiously, and with a searching look among 
the graves : 

It was on this side. I know it was on this 
side.’^ 

Watching her closely lest some chance glance 
of hers should stray his way, he listened still 
more intently and was presently rewarded by 
catching another sentence. 

“A single grave all by itself. I fell over it 
and my mother scolded me, saying it was my 
father^s. There was a bush near it. A bush 
with white flowers on it. I tried to pick some.^^ 

Ransom^s heart was growing lighter and 
lighter. She did not even know that there had 
been placed over that grave a monument with 
her name on it and that of the mother who had 
scolded her for tripping over her father^s sod. 
Only Anitra could be so ignorant or expect 
to find a grave by means of a bush blooming 


224 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


with flowers fifteen years ago. As she went 
wandering on, peering to right and left, he 
thought of Hazen and his doubts, and wished 
that he were here beside him to mark her per- 
plexity. 

When quite satisfied that she would never 
find what she sought without help. Ransom 
stepped from his hiding-place and joined her 
among the grassy hillocks. The start of pleas- 
ure she gave and her almost childish look of 
relief warmed his heart, and it was with a smile 
he waited for her to speak. 

“My father^s grave!’’ she explained. “I 
was looking for my father’s grave. I remember 
my mother taking me to it when I was little. 
There was a bush close by it — oh! I see what 
you think. The bush would be big now — I 
forgot that. And something else! You are 
thinking of something else. Oh, I know, I 
know. He wouldn’t be lying alone any more. 
My mother must have died, or sister would 
have taken me to her. There ought to be two 
graves.” 

He nodded, and taking her by the hand led 
her to the family monument. She gazed at it 
for a moment, amazed, then laid her finger 
on one of the inscriptions. 


MONEY 


225 


father’s name?” she asked. 

He nodded. 

She hung her head thoughtfully for a moment, 
then slipping to the other side of the stone laid 
her hand on another. 

“ My mother’s?” 

Again he signified yes. 

“And this? Is this sister’s name? No, 
she’s not buried yet. I had a brother. Is it 
his?” 

Ransom bowed. How tell her that it was a 
false inscription and that the man whose death 
it commemorated was not only alive but had 
only a little while before spoken to her. 

“ I didn’t like my brother. He was cruel 
and liked to hurt people. I’m glad he’s dead.” 

Ransom drew her away. Her frankness was 
that of a child, but it produced an uncomfort- 
able feeling. He didn’t like this brother either, 
and in this thoughtless estimate of hers he 
seemed to read a warning to which his own 
nature intuitively responded. 

“Come!” he motioned, leading the way out. 

She followed with a smile, and together they 
entered the highway. As they did so. Ransom 
caught sight of a man speeding down the hill 
before them on a bicycle. He had not come 


226 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


from the upper road, or they would have seen 
him as he flew past the gateway. Where had 
he come from, then? From the peep-hole 
where Ransom himself had stood a few minutes 
before. No other conclusion was possible, and 
Ransom felt both angry and anxious till he 
could find out who the man was. This he did 
not succeed in doing till he reached the hotel. 
There a bicycle leaning against a tree gave 
point to his questions, and he learned that it 
belonged to a clerk in one of the small stores 
near by, but that the man who had just ridden 
it up and down the road on a trial of speed was 
th3 stranger who had just come to town with 
Mr. Hazen. 


CHAPTER XXI 


ON THE CARS 

This episode, which to Ransom^s mind would 
bear but one interpretation, gave him ample 
food for thought. He decided to be more cir- 
cumspect in the future and to keep an eye out 
for inquisitive strangers. Not that he had any 
thing to conceal, but no man enjoys having his 
proceedings watched, especially where a woman 
is concerned. 

That Hazen was antagonistic to him he had 
always known; but that he was regarded by 
him with suspicion he had not realized till now. 
Hazen suspicious of him\ that meant what? 
He wished that he had Mr. Harper at his side 
to enlighten him. 

It was now five o’clock and he was sitting 
in his room awaiting the usual report from the 
river, when a quick tap at his door was fol- 
lowed by the entrance of the very man he was 
thinking about. He rose eagerly to receive 
him, determined, however, to allow no incou- 


228 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


siderate impulse to drive him into unnecessary 
speech. 

I have already said too much/^ he reminded 
himself in self-directed monition. “ It^s time 
he did some of the talking.^’ 

Hazen seemed willing enough to do this. 
Taking the seat proffered him, he opened the 
conversation as follows: 

Mr. Ransom, I have been doing you an in- 
justice. I do not consider it necessary to tell 
you just how I have found this out, but I am 
now convinced that you are as much in the 
dark as myself in regard to this unfortunate 
affair, and are as willing as I am to take all 
justifiable means to enlighten yourself. I own 
that at first I thought it more than probable 
you were in collusion with the girl here to de- 
ceive me. That I wouldn’t stand. I’m glad 
to find you as truly a victim of this mystery as 
myself.” 

Ransom straightened himself. 

“ If this is an apology,” he returned, I am 
willing to accept it in the spirit in which it is 
proffered. But I should like something more 
than apology from you. Candor for candor; 
— your whole story in return for mine.” 

" I’m afraid it would be a trifie tedious, — 


MONEY 


229 


my whole story/^ smiled Hazen. “ If you mean 
such part of it as concerns Georgian's peculiar 
actions and the complications with which we 
are at this moment struggling, I can only re- 
peat what I have already told you, both at 
the St. Denis in New York and here. I am 
Georgian's returned brother, saved from the 
jaws of hell to see my own country again. I 
arrived in New York on the tenth. Naturally, 
after securing a room at the hotel, I took up 
the papers. They were full of the approach- 
ing marriage of Miss Hazen. I recognized my 
sister^s name, though not her splendor, for we 
were the sole survivors of a poor country 
family and I knew nothing of the legacy I am 
now told she received. Anxious to see her, I 
attended the ceremony. She recognized me. 
I had not expected this, and feeling old affec- 
tions revive, I followed her friends to the house 
and was presented to them and to you. What 
I whispered to her on this occasion were my 
assumed name and the place where I was to be 
found. My changed countenance called for 
explanations, for which a bridal reception 
offered no opportunity. Besides, as I have 
already said, I stood in sore need of a definite 
amount of money. I meant her to come and 


230 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


see me, but I did not expect her to play a trick 
on you in order to do so. This had its birth 
in the to me unaccountable mystery embodied 
in the girl you call Anitra, but whom Fm not 
ready yet to name. For when I do, action 
must follow conviction and that without mercy 
or delay.^^ 

Action?” repeated Ransom, with quick sus- 
picion and a confused rush of contradictory 
visions in his mind. “What do you mean by 
that?” 

Hazen covered his chin with his hand. 

“ I will try and explain,” he replied. “ If I 
am abrupt in my language, it is owing to the 
exigencies of the case. I have no time to waste 
and no disposition to whitewash a rough piece 
of work. To speak to the point, I have an 
intense interest in my sister Georgian. I have 
little or none in my sister Anitra. Georgian’s 
intelligence, good-will, and command of money 
would be of inestimable benefit to me. Anitra, 
on the contrary, could be nothing but a burden, 
unless — ” here he cast a very sharp glance at 
Ransom — “ unless Georgian should have been 
sufficiently considerate to leave her a good share 
of her fortune in the will you say she made just 
before her disappearance and supposed death,” 


MONEY 


231 


“That I can say nothing about/^ rejoined 
Ransom in answer to this feeler. “ The will is 
in the hands of her lawyer, but if it will help 
your argument any we will suppose that she 
left her sister to the care of her friends without 
any especial provision for her in the way of 
money. 

The steady fingers clutching the scarred 
neck loosed their grip to wave this supposition 
aside. 

“A hardly supposable case,’^ was the cold 
comment with which he supplemented this 
disclaimer; “but one which would make the 
girl a burden indeed; a burden which for many 
reasons I could not assume.^’ Here he struck 
himself sharply on the neck, with the first dis- 
play of passion he had shown. “My advan- 
tages are not such as to make it easy for me to 
support myself. It would be simply impos- 
sible for me to undertake the care of any girl, 
least of all of one with a manifest infirmity.^^ 

“Anitra will prosper without your care,’’ 
replied Ransom, overlooking the heartlessness 
of the man in the mad, unaccountable sense of 
relief with which he listened to his withdrawal 
from concerns for which he showed so little 
sympathy. “ There are others who will be 


232 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


glad to do all that can be done for Georgian's 
forsaken sister.” 

“Yes. That is all right, but — ” Here 
Hazen squared himself across the top of the 
table before which he had been sitting; “I 
must be made sure that the facts have been 
rightly represented to me and that the girl now 
in this house is Georgian's deserted sister. Tm 
not yet satisfied that she is, and I must be con- 
vinced not only on this point but on many 
others, before this day is over. Business of 
great importance calls me back to the city and, 
it may be, out of the country. I may never be 
able to spend another day on purely personal 
affairs, so this one must tell. I have a scheme 
(it is a very simple one) which, if carried out 
as I have planned, will satisfy me as nothing 
else will as to the identity of the girl we will 
call, from lack of positive knowledge, Anitra. 
Will you help me in its furtherance? It lies 
with you to do so.” 

“ First, your reasons for doubting the girl,” 
retorted Ransom. “They must be excellent 
ones for you to resist the evidence of such con- 
clusive proofs as you have yourself been wit- 
ness to since entering this house. I am 
Georgian’s husband. I have the strongest wish 


MONEY 


233 


in the world to see her again at my side; yet 
with the exception of her wonderful likeness to 
my wife, I find nothing in this raw if beautiful 
girl, of the polished, highly trained woman I 
married. I have not even succeeded in start- 
ling her ear — something which I should have 
been able to do if she were not the totally deaf 
woman she appears. Confide to me then your 
reasons for demanding additional proofs of her 
identity. If they carry conviction with them, 
I will aid you in any scheme you can propose 
which will neither frighten nor afflict her.^’ 
Hazen rose to his feet. Narrow as the room 
was, he yielded to his restless desire to move 
about and began pacing up and down the 
restricted quarters bounded by the edge of the 
table and the door. Not until he had made 
the second turning did he speak; then it was 
with seeming openness. 

It^s like putting the torch to my last ship,’^ 
said he; ^^but this is no time to hesitate. Mr. 
Ransom, I do not trust my eyes, I do not trust 
my ears, nor your eyes, nor your ears, nor 
those of any one here, because I have talked 
with a man who was on the same train with my 
sisters. He noticed them because of their 
similar appearance and close intimacy. They 


234 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


were not dressed alike, but they were veiled 
alike and one did not move without the other. 
More than that, they not only walked about 
the various stations where they waited, arm in 
arm, but they sat thus closely joined in the cars 
all the way from New York. This interested 
him especially as he noted great anxiety and 
incessant movement in the one, and complete 
passiveness in the other. She who sat in the 
outer seat was watchful, busy, and ready to 
press the other^s arm at the least provocation, 
but if either spoke it was always the other. It 
was not till the quick rush and shrill whistle of a 
passing train made one start and not the other, 
that he got the idea that one of them was deaf. 
As this was the one by the window, he felt that 
their peculiar actions were now accounted for, 
and indeed thus far it all tallied with what we 
might expect from Georgian traveling with the 
hapless Anitra. But there remained a fact to 
be told, which rouses doubt. When they 

reached G and he saw from their quick 

rising that they were about to leave the train, 
he naturally glanced their way again, and this 
time he caught a glimpse of the inner one’s 
neck. Her veil had become slightly disarranged, 
exposing the whole nape. It was unexpectedly 


MONEY 


235 


dark, almost brunette in color, and quite de- 
void of delicacy; such a skin as one might look 
for in the gipsy Anitra after years of outdoor 
living and a long lack of nice personal atten- 
tion, but not such as I saw and admired a few 
hours ago on the neck of the woman bending 
over her work in the landlady's room. Oh, I 
recognized the difference; I have an eye for 
necks.’^ 

He paused, coming to a standstill in the 
middle of the room, to see what effect his words 
had had on Ransom. 

“ I have that man^s name,’’ he continued, 
“and can produce him if I have time and it 
seems to be necessary. But I had rather come 
to my own decision without any outside inter- 
ference. This is not an affair for public gossip 
or newspaper notoriety. It is a question of 
justice to myself. If this girl is Georgian — ” 
His whole face changed. For a moment 
Ransom hardly knew him. The quiet, self- 
contained man seemed to have given way to 
one of such unexpected power and threat that 
Ransom rose instinctively to his feet in rec- 
ognition of a superiority he could no longer 
deny. 

The action seemed to recall Hazen to him- 


236 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


self. He wheeled about and recommenced his 
quiet pacing to and fro. 

“ I beg pardon/^ he quietly finished. If it 
is Georgian, she must stand my friend. That 
is all I was going to say. If it is, against all 
reason and probability, her strangely restored 
twin, I shall leave this house by midnight, 
never probably to see any of you again. So 
you perceive that it is incumbent upon us to 
work promptly. Are you ready to hear what 
I have to propose?’’ 

^^Yes.” 

Hazen paused again, this time in front of 
the door. Laying his hand Mghtly on one of 
the panels, he glanced back at Ransom. 

You are nicely placed here for observation. 
Your door directly faces the hall she must 
traverse in returning to her room.” 

That’s quite true.” 

She’s in her room now. Ah, you know 
that?” 

^^Yes.” Ransom seemed to have no other 
word at his command. 

Will she come out again before night to eat 
or to visit?” 

There’s no telling. She’s very fitful. No 
one can prophesy what she will do. Sometimes 


MONEY 


237 


she eats in the landlady's room, sometimes in 
her own, sometimes not at all. If you have 
frightened her, or she has been disturbed in any 
way by your companion who shows such in- 
terest in her and in me, she probably will not 
come out at all.” 

But she must. I expect you to see that she 
does. Use any messenger, any artifice, but 
get her away from this hall for ten minutes, 
even if it is only into Mrs. Deo^s room. When 
she returns I shall be on my knees before this 
keyhole to watch her and observe. To see 
what, I do not mean to tell you, but it will 
be something which will definitely settle for 
me this matter of identity. Does this plan 
look sufficiently harmless to meet with your 
approval?” 

'^Yes, but looks cannot always be trusted. 
I must know just what you mean to do. I will 
leave nothing to a mind and hand I do not 
trust any more fully than I do yours. You 
are too eager for Georgian's money; too little 
interested in herself; and you are too sly in 
your ways. I overlooked this when you had 
the excuse of a possible distrust of myself. 
But now that your confidence is restored in me, 
now that you recognize the fact that I stand 


238 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


outside of this whole puzzling affair and have 
no other wish than to know the truth about it 
and do my duty to all parties concerned, secrecy 
on your part means more than I care to state. 
If you persist in it I shall lend myself to nothing 
that you propose, but wait for time to substan- 
tiate her claim or prove its entire falsity.” 

^^You will!” 

The words rang out involuntarily. It al- 
most seemed as if the man would spring with 
them straight at the other^s throat. But he 
controlled himself, and smiling bitterly, added: 

I know the marks of human struggle. I 
have read countenances from my birth. Fve 
had to, and only one has baffled me — hers. 
But we are going to read that too and very 
soon. We are going to learn, you and I, what 
lies behind that innocent manner and her rude, 
uncultivated ways. We are going to sound 
that deafness. I say w,” he impressively 
concluded, because I have reconsidered my 
first impulse and now propose to allow you to 
participate openly, and without the secrecy 
you object to, in all that remains to be 
done to make our contemplated test a success. 
Will that please you? May I count on you 
now?” 


MONEY 


239 


Yes,” replied Ransom, returning to his old 
monosyllable. 

“Very well, then, see if you can make a 
scrawl like this.” 

Pulling a piece of red chalk from his pocket, 
he drew a figure of a somewhat unusual charac- 
ter on the bare top of the table between them; 
then he handed the chalk over to Ransom, who 
received it with a stare of wonder not unmixed 
with suspicion. 

“ Fm not an adept at drawing,” said he, but 
made his attempt, notwithstanding, and evi- 
dently to Hazen’s satisfaction. 

“ You^ll do,” said he. “ ThaFs a mystic 
symbol once used by Georgian and myself in 
place of our names in all mutual correspond- 
ence, and on the leaves of our school-books and 
at the end of our exercises. It meant nothing, 
but the boys and girls we associated with 
thought it did and envied us the free-masonry 
it was supposed to cover. A ridiculous make- 
believe which I rate at its full folly now, but 
one which cannot fail to arouse a hundred 
memories in Georgian. We will scrawl it on 
her door, or rather you shall, and according to 
the way she conducts herseK on seeing it, we 
shall know in one instant what you with your 


240 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


patience and trust in time may not be able to 
arrive at in weeks/^ 

Ransom recalled some of the tests he had 
himself employed, many of which have been 
omitted from this history, and shrugged his 
shoulders mentally, if not physically. If Hazen 
noted this evidence of his lack of faith, he re- 
mained entirely unaffected by it, and in a few 
minutes everything had been planned between 
them for the satisfactory exercise of what Hazen 
evidently regarded as a crucial experiment. 
Ransom was about to proceed to take the first 
required step, when they heard a disturbance 
in front, and the coach came driving up with a 
great clatter and bang and from it stepped 
the lean, well-groomed figure of Mr. Harper. 

^^Bah!’’ exclaimed Hazen with a violent 
gesture of disappointment. “ There comes your 
familiar. Now I suppose you will cry off.” 

“ Not necessarily,” returned Ransom. “ But 
this much is certain. I shall certainly consult 
him before hazarding this experiment. I am 
not so sure of myself or — pardon me — of 
yourself as to take any steps in the dark while 
I have at hand so responsible a guide as the 
man whom you choose to call my familiar.” 


CHAPTER XXII 


A SUSPICIOUS TEST 

Let him make his experiment. It will do no 
harm, and if it rids us of him, well and good.’’ 

Such was Mr. Harper’s decision after hearing 
all that Mr. Ransom had to tell him of the 
present situation. 

“His disappointment when he learns that 
he has nothing to hope for from his sister’s 
generosity calls for some consideration from us,” 
proceeded the lawyer. “Go and have your 
little talk with the landlady or take whatever 
other means suggest themselves for luring this 
girl from her room. I will summon Hazen and 
hold him very closely under my eye till the 
whole affair is over. He shall get no chance 
for any hocus-pocus business, not while I have 
charge of your interests. He shall do just 
what he has laid out for himself and nothing 
more; you may rely on that.” 

Ransom expressed his satisfaction, and left 
the room with a lighter heart than he had felt 
since Hazen came upon the scene. He did not 


242 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


know that all he had been through was as 
nothing to what lay before him. 

It was an hour before he returned. When 
he did, it was to find Hazen and the lawyer 
awaiting him in ill-concealed impatience. These 
two were much too incongruous in tastes and 
interests to be very happy in a forced and 
prolonged tete-a-tete. 

^^Have you done it?” exclaimed Hazen, 
leaping eagerly to his feet as the door closed 
softly behind Ransom. “ Is she out of her 
room? I have listened and listened for her 
step, but could not be sure of it. There seem 
to be a lot of people in the house to-night.” 

Too many,” quoth Ransom. That is why 
I couldnT get hold of Mrs. Deo any sooner. 
Anitra is having her hair brushed or something 
else of equal importance done for her in one of 
the rear rooms. So we can proceed fearlessly. 
Have you looked to see if you can get a good 
glimpse of her door through the keyhole of 
this one?” 

HavenT you already made a trial of that? 
Then do so now,” suggested Hazen, drawing 
out the key and laying it on the table. 

But this was too uncongenial a task for 
Ransom. 


MONEY 


243 


I shall be satisfied/’ said he, “ if Mr. Harper 
tells me that it can.” 

It can,” asserted that gentleman, falling 
on his knees and adjusting his eye to the key- 
hole. Or rather, you can see plainly the face 
of any on^ approaching it. I don’t suppose 
any of us expected to see the door itself.” 

“ No, it is not the door, but the woman enter- 
ing the door, we want to see. Did you ask for 
an extra lamp?” 

^^Yes, and saw it placed. It is on a small 
table ahaost opposite her room.” 

‘^Then everything is ready.” 

All but the mark which I am to put on the 
panel.” 

Very good. Here is the chalk. Let us 
see what you mean to do with it before you 
risk an attempt on the door itself.” 

Ransom thought a minute, then with one 
quick twist produced the following: 



Correct,” muttered Hazen, with what Har- 
per thought to be a slight but unmistakable 


244 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


shudder. One would think you had been 
making use of this very cabalistic sign all your 
life.^^ 

Then one would be mistaken. I have simply 
a true eye and a ready hand.” 

And a very remarkable memory. You 
have recalled every little line and quirk.” 

“That’s possible. What I have made once 
I can make the second time. It’s a peculiarity 
of mine.” 

There was no mistaking the continued in- 
tensity of Hazen’s gaze. Ransom felt his 
color rise, but succeeded in preserving his quiet 
tone, as he added : 

“ Besides, this character is not a wholly new 
one to me. My attention was called to it 
months ago. It was when I was courting 
Georgian. She was writing a note one day 
when she suddenly stopped to think and I saw 
her pen making some marks which I considered 
curious. But I should not have remembered 
them five minutes, if she had not impulsively 
laid her hand over them when she saw me 
looking. That fixed the memory of them in 
my mind, and when I saw this combination of 
lines again, I remembered it. That is why I 
lent myself so readily to this experiment. I 


MONEY 


245 


lent that what you said about her acquaint- 
ance with this odd arrangement of lines was 
true/’ 

Hazen’s hand stole up to his neck, a token 
of agitation which Ransom should have recog- 
nized by this time. 

“ And her account of the use we made of it 
tallied with mine?” 

She gave me no account of any use she had 
ever made of it.” 

That was because you didn’t ask her.” 

Just so. Why should I ask her? It was a 
small matter to trouble her about.” 

^^You are right,” acquiesced Hazen, wheel- 
ing himself away towards the window. Then 
after a momentary silence, It was so then, but 
it is likely to prove of some importance now. 
Let me see if the hall is empty.” 

As he bent to open the door, the lawyer, who 
had not moved nor spoken till now, turned a 
quick glance on Ransom and impulsively 
stretched out his hand. But he dropped it 
very quickly and subsided into his old attitude 
of simple watchfulness, as Hazen glanced back 
with the remark: 

“There’s nobody stirring; now’s your time. 
Ransom.” 


246 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


The moment for action had arrived. 

Ransom stepped into the hall. As he passed 
Hazen, the latter whispered: 

DonT forget that last downward quirk. 
That was the line she always emphasized.” 

Ransom gave him an annoyed look. His 
nerves as well as his feelings were on a keen 
stretch, and this persistence of Hazen^s was 
more than he could bear. 

“ I’ll not forget the least detail,” he answered 
shortly, and passed quickly down the hall, 
while Hazen watched him through the crack 
of the door, and the lawyer watched Hazen. 

Suddenly Mr. Harper’s brow wrinkled. Hazen 
had uttered such a sigh of relief that the 
lawyer was startled. In another moment Ran- 
som re-entered the room. 

“ She’s coming,” said he, striving to hide his 
extreme emotion. “ I heard her voice in the 
hall beyond.” 

Hazen sprang to the door which Ransom had 
carefully closed, and was about to fall on his 
knees before the keyhole when he suddenly 
stiffened himself and, turning towards the 
lawyer, cried with a new strain of loftiness in 
his tone : 

You. You shall do the looking, only prom- 


MONEY 


247 


ise to be very minute in your description of her 
behavior. It^s a great trust I repose in you. 
See that you honor it.^^ 

The revulsion of feeling caused in the 
lawyer by this show of confidence was not 
perceptible. But it softened his step as well 
as his manner as he crossed to do the other's 
bidding. 

The remaining two stood at his side breath- 
less, waiting for his first word. 

It came in a whisper: 

She's approaching her room. She looks 
tired. Her eyes are stealing this way; — no, 
they are resting on her own door. She sees 
the sign. She stands staring at it, but not 
like a person who has ever seen it before. It's 
the stare of an uneducated woman who runs 
upon something she does not understand. 
Now she touches it with one finger and glances 
up and down the hall with a doubtful shake 
of the head. Now she is running to another 
door, now to another. She is looking to see 
if this scrawl is to be found anywhere else; she 
even casts her eye this way — I feel like leav- 
ing my post. If I do, you may know that she's 
coming — No, she's back at her own door 
and — gentlemen, her bringing up or rather 


248 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


coming up asserts itself. She has put her palm 
to her mouth and is vigorously rubbing off the 
marks.’’ 

The next instant Mr. Harper rose. She’s 
gone into her room/’ said he. “ Listen and you 
will hear her key click in the lock.” 

Ransom sank into a seat; Hazen had walked 
to the window. Presently he turned. 

“ I am convinced,” said he. I will not 
trouble you gentlemen further. Mr. Ransom, 
I condole with you upon your loss. My sister 
was a woman of uncommon gifts.” 

Mr. Ransom bowed. He had no words for 
this man at a moment of such extreme excite- 
ment. He did not even note the latent sting 
hidden in the other’s seeming tribute to 
Georgian. But the lawyer did and Hazen 
perceived that he did, for pausing in his act of 
crossing the room, he leaned for a moment 
on the table with his eyes down, then quickly 
raising them remarked to that gentleman : 

“ I am going to leave by the midnight train 
for New York. To-morrow I shall be on the 
ocean. Will it be transgressing all rules of 
propriety for me to ask the purport of my 
sister’s will? It is a serious matter to me, sir. 
If she has left me anything — ” 


MONEY 


249 


She has notj” emphasized the lawyer. 

A shadow darkened the disappointed man^s 
brow. His wound swelled and his eyes gleamed 
ironically as he turned them upon Ransom. 

Instantly that gentleman spoke. 

“ I have received but a moiety/’ said he. 

You need not envy me the amount.” 

^^Who has it then?” briskly demanded the 
startled man. ^‘Who? who? She?^^ 

Mr. Harper never knew why he did it. He 
was reserved as a man and, usually, more than 
reserved as a lawyer, but as Hazen lifted his 
hands from the table and turned to leave, he 
quietly remarked: 

“ The chief legatee — the one she chose to 
leave the bulk of her very large fortune to — 
is a man we none of us know. His name is 
Josiah Auchincloss.” 

The change which the utterance of this name 
caused in Hazen’s expression threw them both 
into confusion. 

“ Why didn’t you tell me that in the begin- 
ning?” he cried. I needn’t have wasted all 
this time and effort.” 

His eyes shone, his poor lips smiled, his 
whole air was jubilant. Both Mr. Harper and 
his client surveyed him in amazement. The 


250 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


lines so fast disappearing from his brow were 
beginning to reappear on theirs. 

Mr. Harper/’ this hard-to-be-understood 
man now declared, “ you may safely administer 
the estate of my sister. She is surely dead.” 


CHAPTER XXIII 

A STARTLING DECISION 

Before Mr. Ransom and the lawyer had re- 
covered from their astonishment, Hazen had 
slipped from the room. As Mr. Harper started 
to follow, he saw the other’s head disappearing 
down the staircase leading to the office. He 
called to him, but Hazen declined to turn. 

No time,” he shouted back. I shall have 
to make use of somebody’s automobile now, 
to get to the Ferry in time.” 

The lawyer did not persist, not at that 
moment; he went back to his client and they 
had a few hurried words; then Mr. Harper went 
below and took up his stand on the portico. 
He was determined that Hazen should not 
leave the place without some further explana- 
tion. 

It was light where he stood and he very soon 
felt that this would not do, so he slipped back 
into the shade of a pillar, and seeing, from the 
bustle, that Hazen was likely to obtain the use 


252 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


of the one automobile stored in the stable, he 
waited with reasonable patience for his re- 
appearance in the road before him. 

Meanwhile he had confidence in Ransom, 
who he felt sure was watching them both from 
the window overhead. If he should fail in 
getting in the word he wanted. Ransom was 
pledged to shout it out without regard to 
appearances. But this was not likely to occur. 
He knew his own persistency to equal Hazen^s. 
Nothing should stop the momentary interview 
he had promised himself. 

Ah ! A well-known whirr and clatter is 
heard. The automobile was leaving the stable. 
Hazen was already in it and the man who had 
come up from New York was with him. This 
was bad; they would flash by — No; he would 
not be balked thus. Stepping out into the 
road, he stopped full in the glare of the office 
lights and held up his hand. They could not 
but see him and they did. The chauffeur re- 
versed the lever and the machine stopped to 
the accompaniment of low muttered oaths 
from Hazen, which were rather disagreeable 
than otherwise to Harper^s ear. 

“One word,^^ said he, approaching to the 
side where Hazen sat. “ I thought you ought 


MONEY 


253 


to know before leaving that we can take no 
proceedings in the matter we were speaking of 
till we have undisputed proof that your sister 
is dead. That we may not get for a long time, 
possibly never. If you are interested in hav- 
ing this Auchincloss receive his inheritance, 
you had better prepare both yourself and him 
for a long wait. The river seems slow to give 
up its dead.” 

The quiver of impatience which had shaken 
Hazen at the first word had settled into a strange 
rigidity. 

“ One moment,” he said in a command 
to the chauffeur at his side. Then in a low, 
strangely sounding whisper to Harper : They 
think the body^s in the DeviFs Cauldron. 
Nothing can get it out if it is. Would some 
proof of its presence there be sufficient to 
settle the fact of her death?” 

^^That would depend. If the proof was un- 
mistakable, it might pass in the Surrogate’s 
Court. What is the matter, Hazen?” 

Nothing.” The tone was hollow; the whole 
man sat like an image of death. “ I — Fm 
thinking — weighing — ” he uttered in scat- 
tered murmurs. Then suddenly, You’re not 
deceiving me. Harper. Some proof will be 


254 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


necessary, and that very soon, for this man 
Auchincloss to realize the money?” 

^^Yes,” the monosyllable was as dry as it 
was short. Harper^s patience with this un- 
natural brother was about at an end. 

‘^And who will venture to obtain this proof 
for us? No one. Not even Ransom would 
venture down into that watery hole. They 
say it is almost certain death,” babbled Hazen. 

Harper kept silence. Strange forces were 
at work. The head of another gruesome tragedy 
loomed vaguely through the shadows of this 
already sufficiently tragic mystery. 

^^Go on!” suddenly shouted Hazen, leaning 
forward to the chauffeur. But the next instant 
his hand was on the man’s sleeve. “No, I 
have changed my mind. Here, Staples,” he 
called out as a man came running down the 
steps, “take my bag and ask the landlady to 
prepare me a room. I’ll not try for the train 
to-night.” Then as the man at his side leaped 
to the ground, he turned to Harper and re- 
marked quietly, but in no common tone : 

“The steamer must sail without me. I’ll 
stay in this place a while and prove the death 
of Georgian Ransom myself.” 


CHAPTER XXIV 

THE DEVIL^S CAULDRON 

The solemnity of Hazen’s whole manner im- 
pressed Mr. Harper strongly. As soon as the 
opportunity offered he cornered the young man 
in the office where he had taken refuge, and 
giving him to understand that further explana- 
tions must pass between them before either 
slept, he drew him apart and put the straight 
question to him: 

Who is Josiah Auchincloss?’^ 

The answer was abrupt, almost menacing in 
its emphasis and tone. 

^^A trunk-maker in St. Louis. A man she 
was indebted to.^’ 

How indebted to — a trunk-maker?’^ 
“That I cannot, do not desire to state. It 
is enough that she felt she owed him the bulk 
of her fortune. Though this eliminates me 
from benefits of a wealth I had some rights 
to share, I make no complaint. She knew 
her business best, and I am disposed to accept 


256 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


her judgment in the matter without criti- 
cism.’’ 

“You are?” The tone was sharp, the sar- 
casm biting. “ I can understand that. For 
Auchincloss, in this will, read Hazen; but how 
about her husband? How about her friends 
and the general community? Do you not 
think they will ask why a beautiful and socially 
well-placed young woman like your sister should 
leave so large a portion of her wealth to an 
obscure man in another town, of whom her 
friends and even her business agent have never 
heard? It would have been better if she had 
left you her thousands directly.” 

The smile which was Hazen’s only retort 
was very bitter. 

“You drew up her will,” said he. “You 
must have reasoned with her on this very point 
as you are now trying to reason with me?” 

The lawyer waved this aside. 

“ I didn’t know at that time the social status 
of the legatee; nor did I know her brother then 
as well as I do now.” 

“You do not know me now.” 

“I know that you are very pale; that the 
determination you have just made has cost 
you more than you perhaps are willing to state. 


MONEY 


257 


That there is mystery in your past, mystery in 
your present, and, possibly, mystery threaten- 
ing your future, and all in connection with your 
great desire for this money/ ^ 

Hazen made a forcible gesture, but whether 
of denial or deprecation, it was not easy to 
decide. 

Would it not then be better for all parties,^’ 
pursued the lawyer, “for you to give me some 
idea of the great obligation under which your 
sister lay to this man, that I may have an 
answer ready when people ask me why she 
passed you so conspicuously by, in order to 
enrich this stranger 

“The story is not mine. Had she wished 
you to know it, she would have confided it to 
you herself. I must decline — 

Mr. Harper interrupted the other impressively. 
“ Do you realize what a shadow may be thrown 
upon your sister^s memory by this reticence on 
your part? Her death was suggestive enough 
without the complications you mention. In jus- 
tice to your relationship you should speak. If, 
as I think, the money is really meant for you, 
say so. The subterfuge may be difficult of expla- 
nation, but it will not hurt her memory as much 
as this extraordinary silence on your part.’' 


258 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


‘‘I am sorry,” began Hazen. But Harper 
cut him short. 

“You expect the money — you yourself,” 
said he. “ Nothing else would force you into 
an attempt so perilous. You would risk death. 
Risk something less final; risk your place in 
my esteem, your standing among men, and con- 
fess the full truth about this matter. If it in- 
volves crime — why, I^m a lawyer and can see 
you through better than you can win through 
by your own misdirected efforts. The truth, 
my lad, the truth, nothing else will serve you.” 

The look he received he will never forget. 

“You are a man of limited experience, Mr. 
Harper,” were the words which accompanied 
it. “You would not understand the truth, 
Georgian or me. Ransom might, but I shall 
not even risk Ransom^s discretion. Now this 
is all I am going to say about this matter. 
Georgian’s last will and testament, followed 
though it was by suicide, was a perfectly regu- 
lar one. The only impediment to its being 
so recognized and acted upon is the doubt as 
to her actual decease. If the body of my poor 
young sister has become lodged in the Devil’s 
Cauldron, I am going there to seek it. As the 
project calls for courage and, above all, a good 


MONEY 


259 


condition of body and mind, I shall be obliged 
to you if you will allow me the benefit of the 
sleep I most certainly need. To-morrow I 
may have something more to say to you, and 
I may not. Perhaps I shall want to make 
my willj who knows And with a smile full 
of sarcastic meaning, he pushed Mr. Harper’s 
arm aside and made for the staircase, up which 
he presently vanished without another at- 
tempt on the lawyer’s part to hold him back. 

A few minutes later the lawyer was getting 
what information he could about the so-called 
Devil’s Cauldron. 

It seems that this was a very deep hole in 
which, on account of the rocky formation sur- 
rounding it, the watei swept in an eddy which 
had the force of a whirlpool. No one had ever 
sounded its depths and nothing had ever been 
seen again which had once been sucked into its 
deathly hollow. That Georgian’s body had 
found its everlasting grave there, many had 
believed from the first, and if the conviction 
had not yet been publicly expressed it was out 
of consideration for Mr. Ransom, to whose 
hopes it could but ring a final knell. 

Where is the hole? How far from the 
waterfall?” queried Mr. Harper. 


260 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


A good mile/^ muttered one man. “ Quite 
around the bend of the stream. It^s a horrid 
place, sir. WeVe always been mortal careful 
about rowing down that side of the river. Chil- 
dren are never allowed to. Only a man's 
strength could get him free again if he once 
struck the eddy." 

“Would anything floating down from the 
falls be apt to strike this eddy?" 

“ Very apt. It would be a miracle if it didn't. 
That is why we all turned out so willingly the 
first day. We knew that if Mrs. Ransom's 
body was to be found at all, it would be found 
then; another day it would be beyond our 
reach." 

“ You say that no one has ever sounded the 
depths of that hole. Has any one ever tried 
to?" 

“ More than once. Scientiflc men and 
others." 

“Did they ever emerge — any of them?" 

“Yes, one, a powerful sort of chap with 
Indian blood in him. But he didn't advise 
any one to try it; said the knowledge wasn't 
worth the strain to heart and muscle." 

“ What was the knowledge? We can imagine 
the strain." 


MONEY 


261 


Oh, he said as how the walls of the vortex 
— didn^t he call it a vortex — was all stone, 
and he spoke of a ledge — I didn^t hear what 
else/’ 

“To go down there a man would have to 
take his life in his hand, I see. Well, I don’t 
think I will try,” dryly observed the lawyer as 
he left the room. 

He could no longer hide his excitement at 
the thought that Hazen meditated this under- 
taking. 

“How he must want money!” thought he. 
That a man should face such a horror for an- 
other man’s profit did not seem likely enough 
to engage his consideration for a moment. 

Lawyer Harper knew the world — or thought 
he did. 

Next day the whole town was thrown into a 
hubbub. Word had gone out through every 
medium possible to so small a place, that Alfred 
Hazen, Georgian’s long-lost brother, was going 
to dare Death Eddy in a final attempt to 
recover his sister’s body. 


PART IV 


The Man of Mystery 
CHAPTER XXV 

DEATH EDDY 

It was a gray day, chill and ominous. As 
the three most interested in the event came 
together on the road facing the point from 
which Hazen had decided to make his desperate 
plunge, the dreariness of the scene was reflected 
in the troubled eye of the lawyer and that of 
the still more profoundly affected Ransom. 
Only Hazen gazed unmoved. Perhaps be- 
cause the spot was no new one to him, perhaps 
because an unsympathetic sky, a stretch of 
rock, the swirl of churning waters without any 
of the lightness and color which glancing sun- 
light gives, meant for him but one thing — the 
thing upon which he had fixed his mind, his soul. 

The rocky formation into which the stream 
ran at this point as into a. pocket, revealed it- 
self in the bald outlines of the point which, 
curving half-way upon itself, held in its cold 
embrace the unseen vortex. One tree, and one 


THE MAN OF MYSTERY 


263 


only, disturbed the sky line. Stark and twisted 
into an unusual shape from the steady blowing 
of the prevalent east winds, it imprinted itself 
at once upon the eye and unconsciously upon 
the imagination. To some it was the keeper 
of that hell-gate; the contorted sentinel of by- 
gone woes and long-buried horrors, if not the 
gnomish genius of others yet to come. To-day 
it was the sign-post to a strange deed — the 
courting of an uncanny death that one of the 
many secrets hidden in that hole of miseries 
might be unlocked. 

Under this tree a small group of strong and 
determined men was already collected; not 
as spectators but helpers in the adventurous 
attempt about to be undertaken by their old 
friend and playmate. The spectators had been 
barred from the point and stood lined up in the 
road overlooking the eddy. They were numer- 
ous and very eager. Hazen^s brows drew to- 
gether in his first exhibition of feeling, as he 
saw women and even children in the crowd, and 
caught the expression of morbid anticipation 
with which they all turned as he stepped with 
his two associates over the rope which had 
been stretched across the base of the out- 
curving head line. 


264 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


Cormorants!” escaped his lips. They look 
for a feast of death, but they will be dis- 
appointed.” He was almost bitter. “ I shall 
survive this plunge. I have no wish for my 
death to be the holiday for a hundred gloating 
eyes, I am not handsome enough. When I 
die, it will be quietly, with some hand near, kind 
enough to cover my poor face with a napkin.” 

Harper and Ransom both remembered this 
remark a little while later. 

^^Mr. Hazen?” It was Harper who spoke. 
They had passed a little thicket of brush and 
were drawing near the group under the tree. 

Have you duly considered what you are about 
to do? I have talked with several men of 
judgment and experience about this attempt, 
and they all say it can have but one termina- 
tion.” 

“ I know. That is because they know little 
or nothing of the life I have led since I left this 
town. There is not a man amongst them so 
slight and seemingly frail of figure as myself, 
but none of them, not one, has been so often 
up to the very gates of death and escaped, as 
I have. My schooling has been long and 
severe, perhaps in preparation for this day. 
I have been through fire; I have been through 


THE MAN OP MYSTERY 


265 


water. The swirling of my own native stream 
does not appall me. I rather welcome it; it 
is but another experience.’’ 

But for money?” broke in Ransom. “ You 
acknowledge it is for no other purpose. Will 
it pay? I own that in my eyes no amount of 
money could pay a man for so superhuman a 
risk as this. Take a few thousands from me 
— I had rather give them to you than see you 
leap into that water opening beneath us like a 
hungry maw.” 

Hazen stood silent, his eye glistening, his 
hand almost outstretched. Harper thought he 
would yield; the offer must have struck him as 
generous and very tempting — a good excuse 
for a hot-headed man to withdraw from a very 
doubtful adventure. But he did not know 
Hazen. This latter advanced his hand and 
squeezed Ransom’s warmly, but his answer, 
when he was ready to give one, conveyed no 
intention of a change of mind. 

^^Will your thousands amount to a clean 
million?” he smiled. That is the amount, I 
believe, bequeathed by your wife to Mr. Auchin- 
closs. Nothing less will suffice. Yet I thank 
you. Ransom.” 

The latter bowed and fell a little behind the 


266 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


others. The struggle in his mind had been 
severe; it was severe yet; he did not know but 
that it was his duty to stop this Hazen from his 
intended action by force. He was not sure 
but that the onus of this whole desperate 
undertaking would yet fall upon him. Cer- 
tainly it would fall upon his conscience if the 
end was fatal. He had had proof of that in 
the long night of wakeful misery he had just 
passed; a night in which he had faced the 
furies; in which this inexorable question had 
forced itself upon him despite every effort on 
his part to evade it. 

Why had he, a humane man, consented to 
this attempt on the part of the devoted Hazen? 
That his mind might be free to mourn his beau- 
tiful young bride whose fatal and mysterious 
secret he was still as far from knowing as in 
the hour he turned to welcome her to their first 
home and found her fled from his arms and 
heart? Or had this suspense, this feeling of 
standing now, as never before, at the opening 
door of fate, a deeper significance, a more active 
meaning? Was this meditated test a crucial 
one, because it opened to him the only possible 
releasement of soul and conscience to the undi- 
vided care of one who had no other refuge in 


THE MAN OF MYSTERY 


267 


life save that offered by his devotion? The 
horror of this self-probing was still upon him 
a* he followed Hazen^s slight and virile figure 
across the rocks, but it fled as he felt the spray 
of the tossing waters dash its chilling reminder 
in his face. 

The event was upon him and he must add 
to his former actions that of a complete and 
determined opposition to the risk proposed or 
possibly forfeit his peace of mind forever. 
Quickening his pace, he reached Hazen and the 
lawyer just as the men awaiting them had ad- 
vanced on their side. Instantly he knew it 
was too late. There was neither time nor 
opportunity for any weak protests on his part 
now. Older men were speaking; men who knew 
the river, the danger, and the man, but even 
they said nothing to him in way of dissuasion. 
They only pointed out what especial points of 
suction were to be avoided, and showed him 
the chain they had brought for his waist and 
how he was to pull upon it the very instant he 
felt his senses or his strength leaving him. 

He answered as a courageous man might, 
and making ready by taking off his coat and 
shoes he gave himself into their hands for the 
proper fastening on of the chain. Then, while 


268 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


the murmur of expectation rose from the crowd 
on the river bank, he stepped back to Mr. 
Ransom and whispered hurriedly in his ear: 

You have a good heart, a better heart than 
I ever gave you credit for. Promise that in 
case I never come out of those waters alive, 
that you will put no obstacle in the way of Mr. 
Auchincloss inheriting his fortune in good 
time. He^s a man worthy of all the assistance 
which money can bring. You do not need her 
wealth; Anitra — well, she will be cared for, 
but Auchincloss — promise — brother.’^ 

Ransom half drew back in his amazement. 
Then started forward again. This man whom 
he had always distrusted, whom he had looked 
upon as Georgian's possible enemy, certainly his 
own, was looking into his eyes with a gaze of 
trust, almost of affection. The money was not 
for himself; he showed it by the noble, almost 
grand look with which he waited for his answer; 
a look that carried conviction despite Ransom’s 
prejudice and great dislike. 

^^You will give me that much additional 
nerve for the task lying before me?” he added. 
And Ransom could only bow his head. The 
man’s mastery was limitless; it had reached 
and moved even him. 


THE MAN OF MYSTERY 


269 


Another moment and a gasp went up from 
fifty or more throats. Hazen had taken the 
chain in his hand, walked to the edge of the 
rock and slipped into the quietest water he 
saw there. 

Strike left!’’ called out a voice. And he 
struck left. The eddy seized him and they 
could see his head moving slowly about in the 
great circle which gradually grew smaller and 
smaller till he suddenly disappeared. A groan 
muffled with horror went up from the shore. 
But the man who held the chain lifted up his 
hand, and silence — more pregnant of antici- 
pation than any sound — held that whole 
crowd rigid. The man played out the chain; 
Harper stared at the seething, tumbling water, 
but Ransom looked another way. The torture 
in his soul was taking shape, the shape of a 
ghost rising from those tossing waters. Sud- 
denly the pent-in breath of fifty breasts found 
its way again to the lips. 

The men who held the chain were pulling it 
in with violent reaches. It dragged more 
slowly, stuck, loosened itself, and finally brought 
into sight a face white as the foam it rose 
amongst. 

“ Dead 1 Drowned 1 ” the whisper went around. 


270 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


But when Hazen was dragged ashore and 
Ransom had thrown himself at his feet, he 
saw that he yet lived, and lived triumphantly. 
Ransom could not have told more; it was for 
others to see and point out the smile that 
sweetened the wan lips, and the passion with 
which he held against his breast some sodden 
and shapeless object which he had rescued 
from those awful depths, and which, when 
spread out and clean of sand, betrayed itself 
as that peculiar article of woman’s clothing, 
a small side bag. 

“ I remember that bag,” said Harper. I 
saw it, or one exactly like it, in Mrs. Ransom’s 
hand when she got into the coach the day we 
all rode up from the ferry. What will he have 
to say about it? and could he have seen the 
body from which it has evidently been torn?” 


CHAPTER XXVI 


HAZEN 

“ An unfathomable man/^ grumbled Mr. Har- 
per, entering Mr. Ransom’s room in marked dis- 
order. “ They say that he has not spoken yet; 
but the coroner is with him and we shall hear 
something from him soon. I expect — ” here 
the lawyer’s voice changed and his manner took 
on meaning — that his report will be final.” 

“ Final ? You mean — ’ ’ 

^^What his fainting face showed. For all 
its pallor and the exhaustion it expressed, 
there was triumph in its every feature. The 
little bag was not all he saw in that pit of hell. 
You must prepare yourself for no common 
ordeal. Ransom; it will take all your courage 
to listen to his story.” 

“ I know.” The words came with difficulty 
but not without a certain manly courage. I 
shall try not to make you too much trouble.” 
Then after a moment of oppressive silence. 
Did you notice, when we all came in, the 


272 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


figure of a woman disappearing up the stair 
way? It was Anitra’s and it paused before it 
reached the top, and I saw her eyes staring down 
at Hazen^s helpless figure with a wildness in its 
inquiry that has sapped all my courage. How 
are we to answer that girl when she asks us 
what has happened? How make her know 
that Hazen is her brother and that he has 
just risked his life to satisfy himself and us 
that Georgian was really lost in that dreadful 
pool.’^ 

The lawyer, darting a keen glance at the 
speaker, softly shook his head. 

“ I am not thinking of Miss Hazen,” said he. 
“ I^m wondering how far the proof he has 
obtained will go.” He paused, listening, then 
made a gesture towards the hall. “There’s 
some one there,” he whispered. 

Ransom rose, and with a quick turn of the 
wrist pulled open the door. 

A man was standing on the threshold, a 
ghastly figure before which Ransom involun- 
tarily stepped back. 

“ Hazen!” he cried; then, as the other tottered, 
he sprang forward again and, reaching out his 
hand to steady him, drew him in with the 
remark, “We were expecting a summons from 


THE MAN OF MYSTERY 


273 


you. We are happy that you find yourself 
able to come to us.^’ 

“The coroner has just gone. The doctors I 
dismissed. I have something to say to you — 
to both of you,” he added as he caught sight 
of Mr. Harper. 

Entering slowly, he sat down in the chair 
proffered him by the lawyer. There was some- 
thing strange in his air, a quiet automaton- 
like quality which attracted the latter^s notice 
and led him to watch him very closely. Ran- 
som was busy with the door, which the strong 
west wind blowing through the hall made diffi- 
cult to close. 

“I — ” The one word uttered, Hazen seemed 
to forget himself. Sitting quite still, he gazed 
straight before him at the open window. There 
was little to be seen there but the swaying 
boughs of the huge tree, but his gaze never left 
those tossing limbs, and his sentence hung sus- 
pended till the movement made by Ransom re- 
crossing the room roused him, and he went on. 

“ I have made the plunge, gentlemen, and 
fortune favored me. I — ” here his voice 
failed him again, but realizing the fact more 
quickly than before, he shook off his apathy, 
and facing the two men, who awaited his slow 


274 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


words with inconceivable excitement, continued 
with sudden concentration upon his subject, 

I saw what I went to see — poor Georgian's 
body. I have satisfied the coroner of this 
fact. The little bag I tore from her side 
proves her identity beyond a doubt. You saw 
it, Mr. Harper. They tell me that you recog- 
nized it at once as the same you saw in her 
hand in the stage-coach. But if you had not, 
the initials on it are unmistakable, G. Q. H., 
Georgian Quinlan Hazen. Auchincloss will get 
his money, and soon, will he not? Answer me 
plainly. Harper. Such an experience merits 
some reward. You will not make difficulties?’’ 

“I?” The lawyer’s query had a strange 
ring to it. He glanced from Hazen to Ransom, 
and from Ransom back to Hazen, whose 
features had now become more composed, 
though they still retained their remarkable 
pallor. 

“ If the proof is positive,” he then went on, 
^^you assuredly can trust both my client and 
myself to remember our promise to you.” 

The coroner, you say, is satisfied?” 

“Yes, with the proof and my sworn state- 
ment. He is obliged to be. No one else, 
least of all himself, feels any desire to go down 


THE MAN OP MYSTERY 


275 


to that whirling eddy for confirmation of my 
story. And they are wise. I do not think 
that any man with less experience than myself 
could sound the depths of that vortex and come 
up alive. The noise — the swirl — the sense 
of being sucked down — down in ever-in- 
creasing fury — but my purpose kept the life 
in me. I was determined not to yield, not to 
faint, till I had seen — and proved — ’’ 

“ What’s that?’^ 

The cry was from Mr. Ransom. A sudden 
gust of wind had torn its way through the 
room, flinging the door wide, and strewing the 
floor with flying papers from the large stand 
in the window. 

“Nothing but wind,” answered Harper, half 
rising to close the door, but immediately sitting 
down again with a strange look at Ransom. 
“ Let be,” he whispered, as the other rose in 
his turn to restore order. “Keep Hazen talk- 
ing. It’s important; imperative. I’ll see to 
the door.” 

But it was the window he closed, not the 
door. 

Ransom, with that obedience natural to a 
client in presence of his most trusted adviser, 
did as he was bid, and turned his full attention 


276 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


back to Hazen instantly. That gentleman, upon 
whom the rushing wind and the havoc it created 
had made little if any impression, rushed again 
into words. 

Fve led an adventurous life,’’ he declared, 
^^and, in the last few years especially, passed 
through many perils and experienced much 
awful suffering. I have felt the pang of hunger 
and the pang of biting despair; but nothing I 
have ever endured can equal the horror which 
beclouded my mind and rendered powerless my 
body as I felt myself sliding from the sight of 
earth and heaven into the jaws of that rapa- 
cious eddy, whose bottom no man had ever 
sounded. 

“ I went in young — I have come out old. 
Look at my hands — they shake like those of 
a man of ninety. Yet yesterday they could 
have pulled to the ground an ox.” 

You saw Mrs. Ransom’s body down in that 
pool some fathoms below the surface,” observed 
the lawyer, after waiting in vain for some word 
from the shrinking husband. Won’t you 
particularize, Mr. Hazen? Tell us just how 
she was lying and where. Mr. Ransom cannot 
but wish to know, difficult as he evidently 
finds it to ask you.” 


THE MAN OF MYSTERY 


277 


The coroner has the story/’ Hazen began, 
with the slow, painful gasp of the unwilling 
narrator. “But I will tell it again; it is your 
right, the painful duty which we cannot escape. 
She was lying, not on the bottom, but in a niche 
of rock into which she had been thrown and 
wedged by the force of the current. One arm 
was free and was washing about; I tried to 
clutch this arm as I went down, but it eluded 
me. When I arose, the rush and swirl of the 
water was against me and I felt my senses 
going, but enough instinct was left for me to 
snatch again at the arm as I passed, and though 
it eluded me again, my fingers closed on some- 
thing, which I was just conscious enough to 
hold on to with a frenzied grip. We have 
spoken of this thing — a little bag which must 
have been fastened to her side, for the end of 
its connecting strap is torn away by the wrench 
I gave it.” 

“Vivid enough; but I am sure you will tell 
me one thing more. Did you see the face of 
this body as well as the arm? It would greatly 
add to the strength of your testimony if you 
could describe it.” 

Ransom, who had been watching Hazen, cast 
a sudden look back at the lawyer as he dropped 


278 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


these insinuating words. Something more than 
a, cold-blooded desire for truth had prompted 
this almost brutal inquisition. He must know 
what it was, if anything in Harper^s well-con- 
trolled countenance would tell him. The re- 
sult transfixed him, for following the lawyer’s 
gaze, which was fixed not on the man he was 
addressing but on a small mirror hanging on 
the opposite wall, he saw reflected in it the face 
and form of Anitra standing in the open door- 
way behind them. 

She was looking at Hazen and, as Ransom 
noted that look, he understood Harper’s pre- 
vious caution and all that lay behind his in- 
sistent and cold-blooded questions. For her 
gaze was no longer one of simple inquiry but 
of horrified understanding; — the gaze of one 
who heard. 

Meantime, Hazen was answering in painful 
gasps the lawyer’s pointed question, “ Did you 
see the face of this body as well as the arm?” 

^^Did I see — God help me, yes. Just a 
glimpse, but I knew it. Eyes that my mother 
had kissed, blind — staring — glassed in awe 
and unspeakable fright. The mouth, whose 
every curve I had studied in the old days of 
perfect affection, drawn into a revolting grin 


THE MAN OF MYSTERY 


279 


and dripping with unwholesome weeds brought 
down from the shallows. All strange, yet all 
familiar — my sister — Georgian — dead — 
stark — but recognizable. Don’t ask me if I 
saw it. I always see it; it is before me now, the 
forehead — the chin — the eyes — ” 

Ransom sprang to his feet. Harper also. 

The girl in the doorway had gone white as 
death, and with outstretched arms and frantic, 
haggard eyes was striving to ward off the 
frightful vision conjured up by her brother’s 
words. The movement made by the two men 
recalled her in an instant to herself, and she 
drew back — the hesitating, appealing, anx- 
ious-eyed girl whom they all knew. But it 
was too late. Hazen had seen as well as the 
others, and leaping in frenzy from his chair 
stood confronting her — a dominant and accus- 
ing figure — between the quietly triumphant 
lawyer and the crushed, almost unconscious 
Ransom. 


CHAPTER XXVII 


SHE SPEAKS 

Hazen^s face was frightful to see; the more 
so that physical weakness contended with the 
outsweep of passion, so great and overwhelm- 
ing in its power and destructive force that to 
the two onlookers it seemed to spring from 
deeper sources than ordinary life and death, 
and have its birth, as well as its culmination, 
in the unknown and all that is most terrible 
in the human mind and human experience. 

Anitra’s eye was spellbound by it. As it 
dilated upon this vision of unspeakable wrath 
and almost superhuman denunciation, her own 
exquisite face filled with a reflected horror, 
almost equaling his in force and meaning, till 
the two awed spectators saw in this moment of 
startled recognition and the up-gathering of two 
great natures, the oncoming of some hideous 
climax for which the many strange and contra- 
dictory experiences of the last few days had not 
served to prepare them. 


THE MAN OF MYSTERY 


281 


'‘You hearr 

In these words Hazen loosed out his soul. 

The keen cry of the wind running through 
the house was his only answer. 

'^You hear!” he repeated, advancing and 
laying a determined hand upon her arm. “ You 
have made a mock of us with your pretended 
deafness. What does it mean — Stop ! no more 
play-acting,^’ he fiercely admonished her, as 
her eyes assumed a look of startled inquiry and 
wandered away in vague curiosity to the papers 
scattered over the floor — “ we have had enough 
of that; you cannot deceive us — you cannot 
deceive me twice. You played at deafness — 
why? Because Anitra must have some dis- 
ability to distinguish her from Georgian? Be- 
cause you are not Anitra? Because you are 
Georgian after all?” 

Georgian ! 

The word fell like a plummet into the hollow 
of that great expectancy. Ransom shivered 
and even Harper’s hard cheek changed color. 
Hazen only stood unmoved, his look, his grasp, 
the spirit behind that look and grasp, implac- 
able and determined. Their influence was ter- 
rible; slowly she succumbed to it against her 
will and purpose, the will and purpose of a very 


282 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


strong woman. Her eyes rose in a painful and 
lingering struggle to his face. Then, with a cry 
her drawn and parched lips could not suppress, 
she flashed them in agony on Ransom, and this 
long-suffering man read in them the maddening 
truth. They were his wife^s eyes; the woman 
before him was indeed Georgian. 

Speak!” rang out the voice of Hazen, as 
Harper, realizing from Ransom^s face what 
Ransom had just realized from hers, stepped to 
the door and closed it. ^^The time is short; I 
have much, very much to do. For my sake, 
for the sake of this much-abused man, whom 
you allowed to marry you, speak out, tell the 
truth at once. You are Georgian.” 

^^Yes,” fell in almost an inaudible whisper 
from her lips. I am Georgian.” Then as he 
loosed his grasp from her arm and she was left 
standing there alone, some instinct of isolation, 
some realization of the mysterious pit she had 
dug for herself and possibly for others, in this 
avowal of her identity, wrought her brain into 
momentary madness, and flinging up her arms 
she fell on her knees before Hazen as under the 
stroke of some unseen thunderbolt. 

You made me say it,” she cried. " On your 
head be the punishment, not on mine nor on 


THE MAN OF MYSTERY 


283 


Then as Hazen drew slowly back, touched 
in his turn by some emotion to which neither 
his look nor gesture gave any clew, she rose to 
her feet, and fixing him with a look-of strange 
defiance, added in milder but no less determined 
tones: tongue unloosed talks long and 

loud. You have made me give up my secret, 
but I shall not stop at that. I shall say more; 
tell all my dreadful history; yours — mine. I 
will not be thought wicked because I under- 
took so great a deception. I will not have this 
good man’s opinion of me shaken; not for a 
minute; what I did, I did for him and he shall 
know it whatever penalty it may incur. He is 
my husband — his love to me is priceless, and I 
will hold it against you — against the Cause — 
against Heaven — yes, and against Hell.” 

Here was truth. To Ransom it came like 
balm and a renewed life. Bounding across the 
room, he strove to seize her hand and draw 
her to himself. But Hazen would not have it. 
His anger, indeterminate before, was concen- 
trated now, and not the white pleading of her 
face, nor the warning gesture of Ransom, could 
hold it back. 

Traitress!” he cried, “traitress to me and 
to the Cause. You thought to escape what is 


284 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


inescapable. Do you know what you have done? 
You have — ” The rest hung in air. A sudden 
weakness had seized him and he sank faltering 
back into a chair Harper pushed towards him, 
still denouncing her, however, with lifted hand 
and accusing eyes, the image — though no longer 
a speaking one — of the implacable and deter- 
mined avenger. 

Georgian, shocked into silence, stared at him 
in a frenzy of complicated emotions to which 
neither of them as yet had given the key capable 
of relieving the maddening tension. 

^‘It is the pool; the pool,” she finally mur- 
mured. Its waters have beaten out your 
life.” But he calmly shook his head. 

It is not in water to do that,” he murmured. 
^^Give me a moment. Fve a question to ask. 
I think a drop of liquor — ” 

Harper had flask in hand almost before the 
word had left the other’s mouth. The draft 
revived Hazen; he looked up at Georgian. “ I 
believe you, so do these men believe you. But 
you were not alone in this plot. Where is 
Anitra? Where is the deaf and solitary one 
you dragged from the streets of New York to 
bolster up your plot? Tell us and tell us quickly. 
Where is Anitra?” 


THE MAN OF MYSTERY 


285 


Anitra? Do you ask that?^’ cried Harper, 
roused to speak for the first time by his bound- 
less amazement and indignation. ^^You have 
described the body in the pool — a description 
which fits either sister, and yet you would make 
this woman tell us what you have seen with 
your own eyes.’^ 

He might as well not have spoken. Neither 
he nor she seemed to hear him. Certainly 
neither heeded. 

^^Anitra?^^ she repeated softly and with a 
strange intonation. “ I am Anitra. I am both 
Georgian and Anitra. There have never been 
two of us since I came into this house.” 


CHAPTER XXVIII 

FIFTEEN MINUTES 

" There have never been but one of us since 
I came into this house.’^ 

Monstrous assertion! or so it seemed to Ran- 
som as the whirl of his thoughts settled and 
reason resumed its sway. Only one! But he 
had himself seen two; so had Mrs. Deo and the 
maids; he could even relate the differences 
between them on that first night. Yet had 
he ever seen them together, or even the shadow 
of one at the same moment he saw the person 
of the other? No, and with such an actress as 
she had shown herself to be these last two days, 
such changes of appearance might be possible, 
though why she should engage in such a deep, 
almost incredible plot was a mystery to make 
the hair rise, — she, the tender, exquisite, the 
beloved woman of his dreams. 

She saw the maddening nature of his confu- 
sion and, springing to him, fell on her knees 
with the imploring cry: 


THE MAN OF MYSTERY 


287 


Patience! Do not try to think — I will 
tell you. It can all be said in a word. I was 
bound to this brother of mine, to do his bid- 
ding, to follow his fortunes through life, and up 
to death, by promises and oaths to which those 
uttered by me at the marriage altar were but 
toys and empty air. Anitra, or the dream 
sister my misery took from the dead, was not 
so bound, so I strove to secure our joy by the 
seeming death of Georgian and a new life as 
her twin. You do not understand; you can- 
not. You have no measure with which to 
gauge such men as my brother. But it will 
be given you. There is no hope now. The 
weakness of a moment has undone us.” 

Ransom must have heard her, after events 
proved that he did, but he gave no token of it. 
The visions that were whirling through his mind 
still held it engrossed. He saw her, not as 
she stood before him now, trembling and 
appealing, but as she had looked to him in the 
hall that first night, as she had looked to him 
down by the mill-stream, as she had looked 
when she told her story as Anitra, and later 
when she had faced the landlady as Georgian, 
and the confusion of it all left no room in his 
conscience for any other impression. But Mr. 


288 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


Harper, though surprised as he had never been 
before in all his professional career, lost him- 
self in no such abyss. With the freedom 
which long-delayed insight into the truth gives 
to a man of his positive nature and training, 
he left speculation and all endeavor to reconcile 
events with her declaration, and plunged at 
once to the obvious question of the moment. 

Fixing his keen gaze on Hazen, he observed 
very quietly, but with an underlying note of 
sarcasm: 

“ If this lady is your sister, Georgian Ransom, 
and there is no Anitra save the fast fading 
memory of the child commemorated in your 
family^s monument, then your statement as to 
the body you saw under the ledge was false?’’ 

The answer came deliberately, unaffected 
both by the manner of the accusation or by 
the accusation itself. 

“ Perfectly so,” said he, “ I saw no body. 
Perhaps my description would have been less 
vivid if I had. My intention you know. This 
woman had deceived me to the point of mak- 
ing me believe that she was indeed Anitra, the 
twin, and not my millionaire sister, and 
Georgian’s fortune being necessary to her heir, 
I wished to cut short the law’s delay by an 


THE MAN OF MYSTERY 


289 


apparent identification. I never doubted from 
the moment this woman faced with such well- 
played ignorance the mark of great meaning we 
had placed upon her door, that Georgian was 
in the river, as you all believed. Why then 
not give her a positive resting-place, since this 
would smooth out all difficulties and hasten 
the very end for which she had apparently 
sacrificed herself.^’ 

If there was any irony in his heart, his 
tongue did not show it. Indeed his manner 
betrayed little. Immobility had again replaced 
all tokens of anger, and immobility which only 
yielded now and then to a slight contortion 
more expressive of physical pain than of mental 
agitation. Yet in Georgian's eyes he had lost 
none of his formidable qualities, for the dismay 
with which she followed his words grew as she 
listened, and reached its height as he added in 
final explanation: 

“ The bag I did draw out of the pool, but only 
because I had taken it down there in my blouse 
front. Did you think a man could see that or 
anything else indeed in that maddening swirl 
of water? 

But it was Mrs. Ransom^s bag,^^ came from 
Harper in ill-disguised amazement. Even his 


290 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


sang-froid was leaving him before these evi- 
dences of a plot so deep as to awaken awe. 
“ Where did you get it? Not from Mrs. Ran- 
som herself? Her own surprise is warranty 
for that.’^ 

“No, I got it from the river, another reason 
why I credited her drowning. It was fished up 
from the sand, a little way from the Fall. My 
man found it; I had sent him there in a vain 
hope that he might find evidence of the tragedy 
which others had overlooked. He did, but he 
told no one but me. You flung the thing too 
far,’’ he remarked to Georgian. “You should 
have dropped it nearer the bank. Only such a 
prodder as my man Ives would ever have 
discovered it.” 

Georgian shook her head, impatient at such 
banalities, in the face of the important matters 
they had to discuss. “ To the point,” she cried, 
“ tell these men what will clear me of every- 
thing but a wild attempt at freedom.” 

“ I have said what I had to say,” returned 
her brother. 

Georgian’s head fell. For a moment her 
courage seemed to fail her. 

Mr. Harper rose and locked the door. 

“ We must have no intruders here,” said he, 


THE MAN OF MYSTERY 


291 


pausing with a certain sense of shock, as he 
noticed the faint smile, full of some sinister 
meaning, which for an instant twisted Hazen^s 
lips at these words. 

But the delay was but momentary. With an 
odd sense of haste he rushed at once to the 
attack. 

Stepping in front of Hazen, he observed with 
force and unmistakable resolution: 

^^Your devotion to the legatee Auchincloss 
cannot possibly be explained by any ordinary 
feeling of obligation. Your sister has men- 
tioned a Cause. Can he by any possibility be 
the treasurer of that Cause? 

But Hazen was as impervious to direct 
attack as he had been to a covert one. 

“ Georgian will tell you,’’ said he. When a 
woman looks as she looks now, and is so given 
over to her own personal longings that she for- 
gets the most serious oaths, the most binding 
promises, nothing can hold back her speech. 
She will talk, and since this must be, let her talk 
now and in my presence. But let it be briefly,” 
he admonished her, and with discretion. An 
unnecessary word will weigh heavily in the end. 
You know in what scales. You shall have just 
fifteen minutes.” 


292 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


He looked about for a clock, but seeing none 
drew out his watch from his vest pocket and 
laid it on the table. Then he settled himself 
again in his chair, with a look and gesture of 
imperative command towards Georgian. 

Struck with dismay, she hesitated and he 
had time to add : “ I shall not interrupt unless 
you pass the bounds where narrative ends and 
disclosure begins.’’ And Harper and Ransom, 
glancing up at this, wondered at his rigidity 
and the almost marble-like quiet into which 
his restless eye and frenzied movements had 
now subsided. 

Georgian seemed to wonder also, for she gave 
him a long and piercing look before she spoke. 
But once she had begun her story, she forgot 
to look anywhere but at the man whose for- 
giveness she sought and for the restoration of 
whose sympathy she was unconsciously plead- 
ing. 

Her first words settled one point which up to 
this moment had disturbed Ransom greatly. 

^^You must forget Anitra’s story. It was 
suggested by facts in my own life, but it was 
not true of me or mine in any of its particulars. 
Nor must you remember what the world knows, 
or what my relations say about my life. The 


THE MAN OF MYSTERY 


293 


open facts tell little of my real history, which 
from childhood to the day I believed my 
brother dead was indissolubly bound up in 
his. Though our fathers were not the same 
and he has old-world blood in his veins, while 
I am of full American stock, we loved each 
other as dearly and shared each other^s life as 
intimately as if the bond between us had been 
one in blood as it was in taste and habit. 
This was when we were both young. Later, a 
change came. Some old papers of his father 
fell into his hands. A new vision of life, — 
sympathies quite remote from those which had 
hitherto engrossed him, led him further and 
further into strange ways and among strange 
companions. Ignorant of what it all meant, 
but more alive than ever to his influence, I 
blindly followed him, receiving his friends as 
my friends and subscribing to such of their 
convictions as they thought wise to express 
before me. Another year and he and I were 
living a life apart, owning no individual exist- 
ence but devoting brain, heart, all we had and 
all we were, to the advancement and perpetua- 
tion of an idea. I have called this idea the 
Cause. Let that name suffice. I can give you 
no other.’’ 


294 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


Pausing, she waited for some look of com- 
prehension from the man she sought to en- 
lighten. But he was yet too dazed to respond 
to her mute appeal, and she was forced to con- 
tinue without it. Indicating Hazen with a 
gesture, she said, with her eyes still fixed on 
those of her husband: 

^^You see him now as he came from under 
the harrow; but in those days — I must speak 
of you as you were, Alfred — he was a man to 
draw all eyes and win all hearts. Men loved 
him, women adored him. Little as he cared 
for our sex, he had but to speak, for the coldest 
breast to heave, the most indifferent eye to 
beam. I felt his power as strong as the rest, 
only differently. No woman was more his 
slave than I, but it was a sister^s devotion I 
felt, a devotion capable of being supplanted by 
another. But I did not know this. I thought 
him my whole world and let him engross me in 
his plans and share his passions for subjects 
I did not even seek to understand. 

I was only seventeen, he twenty-five. It 
was for him to think, not me. And he did think 
but to my eternal undoing. The Cause needed 
a woman’s help, a woman’s enthusiasm. With- 
out considering my motherless condition, my 


THE MAN OF MYSTERY 


295 


helplessness, the immaturity of my mind, he 
drew me day by day into the. secret meshes of 
his great scheme, a scheme which, as I failed 
to understand till it had absorbed me, meant 
the unequivocal devotion of my whole life to 
the exclusion of every other hope or purpose. 
Favored, he called it, favored to stand for 
liberty, the advancement of men, the right of 
every human being to an untrammeled exist- 
ence. And favored I thought myself, till one 
awful day when my brother, coming suddenly 
into my room, found me making plans for an 
innocent pleasure and told me such things 
were no longer for me, that a great and im- 
mortal duty awaited me, one that had come 
sooner than he expected, but which my youth, 
beauty, and spirit eminently fitted me to carry 
on to triumph. 

I was frightened. For the first time in my 
memory of him he looked like his Italian 
father, the man we had all tried to forget. 
Once while rummaging amongst my mother^s 
treasures I had come across a miniature of 
Signor Toritti. He was a handsome man but 
there was something terrible in his eye ; some- 
thing to make the ordinary heart stand still. 
Alfred's burned with the same meaning at this 


296 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


moment, and as I noted his manner, which was 
elevated, almost godlike, I realized the differ- 
ence in our heredity and how natural to him 
were the sacrifices for which my mind and 
temper were as naturally unprepared. With 
difficulty I asked him to explain himself, and 
it was with terror that I listened when he did. 
He may have been made to ask, but I was not 
made to hear such words. He saw my inner 
rebellion and stopped in mid-harangue. He 
has never forgiven me the disappointment of 
that moment. I have never forgiven him for 
making me sign away my independence, my 
holdings, and my life to a Cause I did not 
thoroughly understand.’’ 

“Your life?” echoed Ransom, roused to 
involuntary expression by this word. 

“Surely not your life,” echoed the lawyer, 
with the slow credulity of the matter-of-fact 
man. 

“I have said it,” she murmured, her head 
falling on her breast. At which token of weak- 
ness, Hazen stirred and took the words from 
her mouth. 

“The organization,” said he, “is a secret 
one and its code is self-sacrifice. To the band 
of noble men and women, of whose integrity 


THE MAN OF MYSTERY 


297 


and far-reaching purpose you can judge little 
from the whinings of a love-sick girl, life and 
all personal gratifications are as dust in the 
balance against the preservation and advance- 
ment of universal happiness and the great 
Cause. I thought my sister, young as she was, 
sufficiently great-minded to comprehend this 
and sufficiently great-hearted to do the society's 
bidding with joy at the sacrifice. But I found 
her lacking, and — ” He stopped and almost 
lost himself again, but roused and cried with 
sudden fire, “ Tell what I did, Georgian.’^ 

“You took my duty on yourself, she con- 
ceded, but coldly. “That was brotherly; that 
was noble, if you had not exacted a vow from 
me in return, destined to lay waste my whole 
life. Released from this one great duty, I was 
to hold myself ready to fulfil all others. At 
the lift of a hand — a finger — I was to leave 
whatever held me and go after the one who 
beckoned in the name of the Cause. No cir- 
cumstances were to be considered; no other 
human duty or affection. If it were to enter 
upon a fuller and more adventurous life, well 
and good; if it were to encounter death and the 
cessation of all earthly things, that was well 
too, and a good to be embraced with ardor. 


298 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


Obedience was all, and obedience at a mere 
signal! I took the oath and then — ” 

“Yes, then — emphasized Hazen in waver- 
ing but peremptory tones. 

“ He told me what had led to all this misery. . 
That as yet this compact was between us two, 
and us two only. That he had considered my 
youth, and in speaking of me to the Chief 
had held back my name even while promising 
my assistance. That he should continue to 
consider it, by keeping my name in reserve till 
he had returned from his mission, and if that 
mission failed, or succeeded too well, and he did 
not return, I might regard myself as freed from 
the Cause, unless my enlarging nature led me 
to attach myself to it of my own free will. 
That said, he went, and for a year I lived under 
the dread of his return and all the obligations 
that return would entail. Then came tidings 
of his death, tidings for which he may not have 
been responsible, but which he never contra- 
dicted, and I thought myself free — free to 
enjoy life, and the fortune that had so un- 
expectedly come to me; free to love and, alas! 
free to marry. And that is why,^^ she pur- 
sued, in all the anguish of a dreadful retrospect, 
“I recoiled in such horror and hung, a dead 


THE MAN OF MYSTERY 


299 


weight on your arm, when on turning from the 
altar where we had just pledged ourselves to 
mutual love and mutual life, I saw among the 
faces before me the changed but still recog- 
nizable one of my brother, and beheld him 
make the fatal sign which meant, ^ You are 
wanted. Come at once.’” 

Wretch!” issued from the frenzied lips of 
the half-maddened bridegroom, as his glance 
flashed on Hazen. Had you no mercy? Have 
you no mercy now, that you should torture 
her young, credulous soul with these fanci- 
ful obligations; obligations which no human 
being has any right to impose upon another, 
whatsoever the Cause, holy or unholy, he rep- 
resents?” 

“Mercy? It is the weakness of the easy 
soul. There is no ease here,” he cried, touch- 
ing his breast with no gentle hand. 

“Then you forget my money,” suggested 
Georgian. “ Can you expect mercy from a 
man who sees a million just within his grasp? 
I know,” she acknowledged, as Hazen lifted 
that same ungentle hand in haughty protest, 
“ that it was not for himself. I do not think 
Alfred would disturb a fly for his own com- 
fort, but he would wreck a woman’s hopes, a 


300 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


good man^s happiness for the Cause. He ad- 
mitted as much to me, and more, in the inter- 
view we held that afternoon at the St. Denis. 
I had to go to him at once, and I had to employ 
subterfuge in order to do so,’^ she went on in 
rapid explanation, as she saw her husband^s 
eye refill with doubt under a remembrance of 
the shame and anguish of that unhappy after- 
noon. I had not the courage to leave you 
openly at the carriage door. Besides, I hoped 
to work on Alfred^s pity in our interview to- 
gether, or, if not that, to buy my release and 
return to you a free woman. But the wound 
which had changed his face for me had changed 
and made hard his heart. He had other pur- 
poses for me than quiet living with a man who 
could have no real interest in the Cause. The 
money I inherited, the rare and growing beauty 
which he declared me to have, were too valuable 
to the brethren for me to hope for any exist- 
ence in which their interests were not para- 
mount. I might return to you, subject to the 
same authoritative beck and call which had put 
me in my present position, or I might leave 
you at once and forever. No half measures 
were possible. Was I, a bride, loving and be- 
loved by my husband, to listen to either of 


THE MAN OF MYSTERY 


301 


these alternatives? I rebelled, and then the 
thunderbolt fell. 

“ I was no longer on probation, no longer 
subject to his will alone. I was a fully affiliated 
member. That day my name had been sent 
to the Chief. This meant obedience on my part 
or a vengeance I felt it impossible to consider. 
While I lived I need never hope again for free- 
dom without penalty. 

While I lived the words rang in my ears. 
I did not need to weigh them; I knew that they 
were words of truth. There is no power on 
earth so inescapable as that exercised by a 
secret society, and this one has a terrible safe- 
guard. None but he who keeps the list knows 
the members. You, Roger, might be one, and 
I never suspect it, unless you chose to give 
me the sign. Knowing this, I realized that 
my life was not worth the purchase if I sought 
to cross the will of my own brother. Nor 
yours, either. It was the last thought which 
held me. While I dutifully listened, my mind 
was working out the deception which was 
to release me, and when I left him it was to 
take the first step in the complicated plot by 
which I hoped to recover my lost happiness. 
And I nearly succeeded. You have seen what 


302 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


I have borne, what difficulties I have faced, 
what discoveries eluded, but this last, this 
greatest ordeal, was too much. I could not 
listen unmoved to a description of my own 
drowned body. I, who had calculated on all, 
had not calculated on this. The horror over- 
came me — I forgot — perhaps because God 
was weary of my many deceptions!’’ 


CHAPTER XXIX 


THERE IS ONE WAY’’ 

“Have you done?’^ 

Hazen was on his feet and, rigid still, but ’ 
oscillating from side to side, as though his 
strength did not suffice to hold him quite 
erect, was surveying them with eyes sunk so 
deeply in his head that they looked like dying 
sparks reanimated for an instant by some 
passing breath. 

The half-fainting woman he addressed did 
not answer. She was looking up at Ransom 
for the sympathy and pardon he was as yet too 
dazed to show. 

Hazen made a move. It was that of physical 
suffering sternly endured. 

“ Let me speak,’^ he urged. “ I have a ques- 
tion to ask. I must ask it now. Who was the 
woman who came up from New York with you? 
There were two of you then.’’ 

Without turning her head Georgian replied: 

“ That was Bela, my maid; the same one who 


304 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


personated me on the afternoon of my wed- 
ding/^ 

“ That accounts for the coarseness of her 
neck/’ Hazen explained with a certain grim 
humor to the lawyer, who had given a slight 
start of surprise or humiliation. Then quietly 
to Georgian : 

“ Was it she who threw the comb and dropped 
your bag where my man found it?” 

threw the comb; threw it from my win- 
dow before I uttered that loud shriek. It did 
not go very far; but I had to be satisfied with 
the fact that it lay in the direction of the 
waterfall. But it was to Bela I entrusted the 
flinging of the bag. I gave it to her when she 
left the coach. I had explained to her long 
before just what a place she would find her- 
self in when she was set down at the foot of 
the lane; how she was to make her way in 
the darkness till she came to where there were 
no more trees, when she was to strike across to 
the stream, led by the noise of the waterfall. 
I was very particular in my directions, because I 
knew the danger she incurred of slipping into 
the chasm. It was her fear of this and the more 
than ordinary darkness, I presume, which 
made her throw the bag hap-hazard. I simply 


THE MAN OF MYSTERY 


305 


wanted it dropped on the bank above the 
waterfall.” 

“ I saw the girl,” Mr. Harper broke in. She 
wore a black skirt like the one you now wear, 
a black blouse and a red-checked handkerchief 
knotted about her throat. But the young 
woman who was seen leaving these parts the 
next morning had on some kind of a red dress 
and wore a hat. Bela had thrown away her 
hat; it was picked up where the coach stopped 
and afterwards brought here.” 

“I know. My plans went deep; I foresaw 
the possibility of her being recognized by her 
clothes. To guard against this, I had her 
skirt and blouse made double, the one side 
black, the other a bright color. She had 
simply to turn them. The extra hat she car- 
ried with her; it was small and easily con- 
cealed. Her neckerchief she probably tucked 
away. I had its mate in my pocket, and when 
I left my room by the window, as I did the 
moment after I had locked the two rooms, it 
was with my hair pulled down and this necker- 
chief about my shoulders. How did I dare 
the risk! I wonder now; but it was life, life I 
was after; life and love; nothing else would 
have made me so fearless; nothing else would 


306 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


have given me such confidence in myself or 
lent such speed to my feet, running as I did in 
the darkness/’ 

You ran around the house to the lane, and 
entered it by the turnstile.” 

^^Yes, and so quickly that I had time to 
splash myself with mud and lose all my natural 
characteristics before any one came to find 
me. It was Anitra they met, panting and di- 
sheveled, at the head of the lane; Anitra in 
appearance, Anitra in heart. I did not act a 
part; I was Anitra; Anitra as I had conceived 
her. To me she was and is an active, living 
personality. Whenever I faced you in her 
character, I thought with her half-educated 
mind; felt with her half-disciplined heart. I 
even shut my ears to sounds; I would not 
hear; half the time I did not. Nor did I fall 
back into my old ways when I was alone. 
From the minute Georgian closed her door 
upon you for the last time, and I darkened my 
skin in preparation for a permanent assump- 
tion of Anitra’s individuality, I became the 
imaginary twin, in thought, feeling, and action. 
It was my only safeguard. Alas! had I only 
gone one step further and made myself really 
deaf!” 


THE MAN OF MYSTERY 


307 


The cry was bitterness itself, but it passed 
unheeded. Mr. Ransom could not speak and 
Hazen had other cares in mind. 

“ Where is this woman Bela now?’’ he asked. 

Georgian was too absorbed or too unwilling, 
to answer. 

He repeated the question, this time with an 
authority she could not resist. Rising slowly, 
she faced him for one impressive moment. 

“My God!” came from her lips in startled 
surprise. “How pale you are! Sit down or 
you will fall.” 

He shook his head impatiently. 

“ It’s nothing. Answer my question. Where 
is this Bela now?” 

“ I don’t know. She is beyond my reach — 
and yours, I told her to lose herself. I 
think she is clever enough to do so. The 
money I paid her was worth a few years spent 
in obscurity.” 

The spark lighting his eye brightened into 
baleful flame, but she met it calmly. An 
indomitable spirit confronted one equally in- 
domitable, and his was the first to succumb. 
Turning from her, Hazen took out pencil and 
paper from his pocket, and, crossing to the 
window with that same peculiar and oscillat- 


308 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


ing motion of which he seemed unconscious, or 
which he found it 'impossible to subdue, he 
wrote a line, folded it, and before even Harper 
was aware of his purpose threw up the sash 
and flung it out, uttering a quick, sharp whistle 
as he did so. 

What’s that you’re up to?” shouted the 
lawyer, rushing to the window and peering 
over the other’s shoulder into the open space 
below, from which a man was just disappear- 
ing. 

^^Am I a prisoner of the police that you 
should ask me that? ’’returned Hazen, haughtily. 

“ No, but you should be,” retorted Harper. 

I don’t like your ways, Hazen. I don’t like 
what you and your sister have said about the 
Cause and the conscienceless obedience ex- 
acted from its members. I don’t like any of 
it; least of all this passing over of poor Bela’s 
name to one whose duty it will possibly be to 
make trouble for her.” 

Hazen smiled and moved from the window. 
No one there had ever seen such a smile before, 
and the oppression which it brought heightened 
Georgian’s fear to terror. 

“Let be!” she cried, lifting her hands to- 
wards Harper in inconceivable anxiety. “A 


THE MAN OF MYSTERY 


309 


quarrel with him will not help you and it may 
greatly injure me, Alfred, what am I to ex- 
pect? Something dreadful, I can see. Your 
face is not the face of one who forgives, or who 
sees in a gift of money an adequate recompense 
for a cowardly withdrawal.’^ 

^^You read rightly,” said he. “Your for- 
tune will be accepted by the Chief, but he will 
never forget the cowardice. What faith can 
he put in one who prefers her own happiness 
to the general good? You must prepare for 
punishment.” 

“Punishment!” broke scornfully from Har- 
per’s lips. 

She hushed him with a look before which 
even he stood aghast. 

“ You will only waste words,” she cried. 
“ If he says punishment, I may expect punish- 
ment.” And turning back to Ransom, in a 
burst of longing and passion, she raised hei 
eyes to him again, saying, “You do not forgive 
because you do not realize my danger. But 
you will realize it when I am gone.” 

Ransom, under a sudden releasement of the 
tension of doubt and awe which had hitherto 
held him speechless, gave her one wild stare, 
then caught her to his breast. 


310 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


She uttered a happy sigh. 

“ Ah!’^ she murmured in the soft ecstasy and 
boundless relief of the moment, ^^how I have 
learned to love you during the fears and agonies 
of this awful week.’^ 

“And I you,” was the whispered answer. 
“ Too deeply,” he impetuously added in louder 
tones, “ to let any harm come to you now.” 

She smiled; but desperation fought with love 
in that smile. Gently releasing herself, she 
cast another glance at Hazen, upon whose gray 
and distorted countenance there had settled a 
great gloom, and passionately exclaimed: 

“ Had law or love been able to interfere with 
the judgment of our Chief, I should not have 
been driven into the herculean task of deceiv- 
ing you and the whole world as to my real 
identity.” Then with slowly drooping head, 
and the manner of one who has heard his doom 
pronounced, she hoarsely whispered; “The 
death-mark was scrawled upon my door last 
night. This is never done without the consent 
of the Chief. No one can save me now, not 
even my own brother.” 

“False. I scrawled those lines,” declared 
Ransom. “ It was a test — ” 

“ Which / commanded you to make,” put in 


THE MAN OF MYSTERY 


311 


Hazen. Then in fainter and less strenuous 
tones, “ She’s right. Georgian Ransom is 
doomed; no one can save her.” 

“False again!” This time it was Harper 
who interposed. “ I can and will. You forget 
that I know the name of your Chief. Con- 
spiracy such as you hint at is indictable in this 
country. I am a lawyer. I shall protect, not 
only your sister, but her money.” 

The smile he received in return evinced no 
ordinary scorn. 

“Try it,” said he. Then with a laugh so 
low as to be almost inaudible, yet so full of 
meaning that even Harper’s cheek lost color, 
he calmly declared: “No one knows the name 
of our Chief. Auchincloss is a member and a 
valuable one — the only one whose name Georgian 
positively knows; but he’s but a unit in a thou- 
sand. You cannot reach the Head or even the 
Heart of this great organization through him, 
and if you did and punished it, the Cause would 
grow another head and you would be as far 
from injuring us as you are now. Georgian is 
right. Not even I can save her now.” Then, 
with a steady look into each of their faces, he 
smiled again and one and all shuddered. “ But 
the Cause will go on,” he cried in tones ringing 


312 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


with enthusiasm. “ Mankind will drop its 
shackles and we, we shall have unriveted one 
of its chains. It is worth dying for, I, Alfred 
Hazen, say it.’^ 

Slowly he sank back into his chair. The 
pallor which had astounded all from the first 
had now become the ghastly mask of a soul 
whose only token of life glimmered through the 
orbits of his fast glazing eyes. He breathed, 
but in great pants. Georgian became alarmed. 

^^What is it?’’ she cried, forgetting her own 
fears and threats in the horror which his appear- 
ance excited. ^^This is something more than 
exhaustion from the pounding of that mur- 
derous eddy. What have you done? Tell me, 
Alfred, tell me.” 

For the first time since his entrance into the 
room a suggestion of sweetness crept into his 
tone. 

Simply forestalled the verdict of the Chief,” 
said he. I was under oath to leave the 
country to-day on no ordinary errand. I 
failed to keep my word, believing that the in- 
terests of the Cause could be better served by 
what I have here undertaken than by the ful- 
filment of my primal duty. But we are not 
allowed the free exercise of our own judgment. 


THE MAN OF MYSTERY 


313 


else what man could be depended on? With us, 
neglect means death, no matter what the 
excuse or the Cause’s benefit. I knew this 
when I made my choice last night. I have 
been dying ever since, but only actually since 
I came into this room. When the doctors 
decided that I had received no mortal hurt in 
the eddy, I — ” 

“Alfred!” The sister-heart spoke at last. 
“Not — not poison!” 

“ That is what you may call it here,” said he, 
with a return to his old imperious manner, “ but 
later and to the world it will be kindness on 
your part to name it exhaustion — the effect 
of my battle with the water. The doctors 
will reconsider their diagnosis and blame my 
poor heart. You will have no trouble about 
it. It is my heart — I feel it failing — fail- 
ing — ” 

He was sinking, but suddenly his whole 
nature flared up. Bounding to his feet, he 
stood before them, with eyes aflame and a 
passionate strength in his attitude which held 
them spellbound. 

“ What can law, what can selfish greed, 
what can self-aggrandizement and the most 
pitiless ambition effect against men who own 


314 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


to such discipline as this? Nothing. The world 
will go on, you will try your little ways, your 
petty reforms, your slow-moving legislation 
and promise of justice to the weak, but the in- 
vincible is the ready; ready to act; ready to 
suffer, ready to die so that God is justified of 
his children and man lifted into brotherhood 
and equality. You cannot strive against the 
unseen and the fearless. The Cause will triumph 
though all else fails. Georgian, I am sorry — 
He was tottering now, but he held them back 
with a stern gesture, I donT think I ever 
knew just what love was. There is one way 
— only one — 

But from those lips the explanation of this 
one way never came. As they saw the change 
in him and rushed to his support, his head fell 
forward on his breast and all was over. 


CHAPTER XXX 


NOT YET 

They had laid him on the bed and Mr. 
Harper, in his usual practical way, was hasten- 
ing to rouse the house, when Georgian stepped 
before him and laid her hand upon the door. 

“Not yet,’^ said she with authority. “He 
said there was a way — let us find it before we 
give up our secret and our possible safety. 
Mr. Harper, have you guessed that way?” 

“ No, except the usual one of protection 
through the law which he scouts. I do not 
believe, Mrs. Ransom, in any other being 
necessary. Your brother's threats answered a 
very good purpose while he was alive, but now 
that he is dead they need not trouble you. I^m 
not even sure that I believe in the organiza- 
tion. It was mostly in your brother's brain, 
Mrs. Ransom; there^s no such band, or if there 
is, its powers are not so unlimited as he would 
make you believe.” 

She simply pointed to the motionless form 


316 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


and the distorted face which were slowly assum- 
ing an expression of great majesty. 

“There is my answer/^ said she. “Men of 
his strong attributes do not kill themselves 
from fancy. He knew what he did.” 

“And you think — ” 

“That I will not live a week if I pass that 
door under the name of Georgian Ransom. 
Mr. Harper, I am sure of it; Roger, I beg you 
to believe what I say. It may not come here 
— but it will come. The mark has been set 
against my name. Death only will obliterate 
this mark. But the name — that is already 
a dead one — shall it not stay so? — It is 
the one way — the way he meant.” 

“ Georgian!” 

It was a cry of infinite protest. Such a cry 
as one might expect from the long-suffering 
Ransom. It drew her from the door; it brought 
her to his side. As th<^ir eyes and hands met. 
Harper stepped back to the bedside, and re- 
membering the sensitiveness of the man before 
him, softly covered his poor face. When he 
turned back, Mrs. Ransom was slowly shak- 
ing her head under her husband^s prolonged 
look and saying softly: 

“ No, not Georgian, Auitra. Henceforth 


THE MAN OF MYSTERY 


317 


Anitra, always Anitra. Can you endure the 
ordeal for the sake of the safety and peace of 
mind it will bring?” 

“I endure it! Can you? Remember the 
deafness that marks Anitra.” 

“ That can be cured.” Her smile turned 
almost arch. “We will travel; there are great 
physicians abroad.” 

“ A sister — not a wife?” 

“ Your wife in time — Ah, it will mean a new 
courtship and — Anitra is a different woman 
from Georgian — she has suffered — you will 
love her better.” 

“ O God ! Harper, are we living, awake, 
sane? Help me at this crisis. I do not know 
where I am or what this is she really asks.” 

“She asks the impossible. She asks what 
you can, perhaps, give, but not what I can. 
You forget that this deception calls for con- 
nivance on my part, and whatever you may 
think of me or my profession, deception is 
foreign to my nature and very repugnant to 
me.” 

“And you refuse?” 

“ Mrs. Ransom, I must.” 

The hope which had held her up, the life 
which had returned to body and spirit since 


318 


THE CHIEF LEGATEE 


this prospect of a possible future had dawned 
upon her, faded from glance and smile. 

“Then good-by, Roger, we shall never have 
those happy days together of which we have 
often dreamt. I may stay with you a week, a 
month, a year, but the horror of a great fear will 
be over us, and never, never can we know joy.’’ 

She threw herself into her husband’s arms; 
she clung to him. 

“One moment,” she cried, “one moment of 
perfect happiness before the shadow falls. 
Oh, how I must love you, Roger, to say such 
words, to think such thoughts, with the body 
of the brother I loved so deeply once, lying 
there dead before us, killed by his own hand.” 

Ransom softly drew her aside where her 
eyes could not fall upon the bed. 

Harper stopped still where he was, the pic- 
ture of gloom and uncertainty. 

“ It must be settled now,” said Ransom. 
“As we leave this room, our relations must 
remain.” 

“I cannot but think your fears all folly,” 
muttered Harper. “ Yet the responsibility you 
force upon me is terrible. If it were not for 
that will! How can I present it to the Sur- 
rogate when I know the testator is still alive?” 


THE MAN OF MYSTERY 


319 


“You need not. I will do that,” said Ran- 
som. 

“And the property! Given to a man we 
none of us know. Property that is not legally 
his.” 

“I will make it so,” cried Georgian with a 
burst of new and uncontrollable hope as she 
saw, as she thought, this conscientious lawyer 
yielding. “There is paper here; draw up a 
deed of gift. I will sign it and you shall hold 
it so that whether I live or die, Auchincloss^ 
title to his money shall be absolute. Thus 
much I wish to do, that Alfred^s life should not 
have been sacrificed for nothing.” 

“ Let me think.” 

Harper was wavering. 

A half-hour later the door of Ransom’s 
room was flung hurriedly open, and loud cries 
for Mrs. Deo and the office clerk rang through 
the house. And when they and others came 
running at the call, it was to find Mr. Ransom 
and the lawyer hanging over the recumbent 
figure of the dead Hazen, and the deaf girl 
Anitra pointing at the group, with wild and 
inarticulate cries. 


THE END 













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